


The Transfer

by catsvrsdogscatswin



Series: The "T" Saga [3]
Category: Soul Eater
Genre: Body Horror, Existential Horror, F/M, Graphic Violence, Horror, Horror Setting, I don't know why I bother excusing it anymore, I removed the whole No Pairings Tag, Magic, Manga World with elements of Anime, No Canon/OC though, Plot Avoidance, Psychological Horror, Swearing, World Exploration, Worldbuilding, everyone following this series knows I love to write gore and profane reactions thereof, gonna be some scary stuff in this one, how implicitly scandalous, in other words less pantyshots and happier endings, speaking of which, there's Kishin and frightened teenagers of course this story has extreme swearing and violence, you're safe from that here
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:54:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 13
Words: 91,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24800377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catsvrsdogscatswin/pseuds/catsvrsdogscatswin
Summary: Arya still doesn't know why she keeps bouncing around from anime to anime, but she won't let that stop her from learning how. Luckily, the DWMA is there with an exceptionally large library to help her find the truth.Unluckily, the materials she needs are only accessible to "Death Scythes and certain high-ranking meisters," both of which she is not. But that rank's easily fixable...right?Theoretically able to be read as a stand-alone.
Series: The "T" Saga [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1622710
Comments: 6
Kudos: 7





	1. Orientation

**Author's Note:**

> *kicks down door* I'm back, bitches!
> 
> In other words, unlike the prior two installments of this series, Soul Eater is a fandom I have actually written in before (technically I did write some Black Butler before The Teacher, but that was never finished). Please for the love of Christ do not look at what I wrote on FF.net before this. I was in middle school and that shit should never see the light of day, except I'm also a weenie with a phobia of deleting stuff some OTHER middle school gremlin will enjoy, so…it's still there. Lurking. Reminding me of my shame. Bleh.
> 
> Fair warning to those of you that need it, but unlike my other fics which feature violence and swearing, this fic will also have a significant amount of horror. Unspecific I know, but like –body horror, existential horror, psychological horror, more graphically-described-violence. Y'know, horror. Scary stuff. Suspense. Also, since I take the gentle liberty of assuming the DWMA would train their students to actually effectively face, track, and investigate the monsters they're fighting, rather than pointing in a direction and saying "sic 'em," this story will also feature a fair amount of forensic science, psychology, and criminology being tossed around. I've taken a decent amount of psychology courses, but the other two are not fields I'm confident in and therefore I may get stuff wrong sometimes. Give a holler if I do, I'll correct my mistakes.
> 
> ALSO, this fic is going to take a while, since (slight spoiler) I run Arya through all of the 99 Kishin required to create a Death Scythe. Probably 100 chapters minimum. So...buckle up kiddos, we're gonna go on a bit of a ride with this one.
> 
> Also, if you've read my Trekker and Teacher fanfics, you may ignore the portion below and simply continue reading, but for those of you who have not, this is in fact a continuation of a series that includes prior fics in Hetalia and Black Butler. It can be read alone, but I WILL reference a lot of things from those fics, so here's a premise of what happened in them:
> 
> Aryana "Arya" Thompson was a 16-year-old female from Virginia, USA. Due to a "spell" that a casual internet friend gave her to try, she was sucked out of our world and placed in the Hetalia one. As she enters the world and associates with the characters, they are attacked by the "2p!s" ("Second Players"), a fanon, darker version of the Hetalia characters. After much fighting, hardship, and near-death experiences, they (Arya and the canon characters) defeat the 2p!s and send them to a far-distant world they can't escape from. During her stay in the Hetalia world, Aryana (who prefers Arya) learned fluent German and a somewhat basic grasp of Italian, although she did learn a lot of curse words from her teacher, as well as gun safety (she was not a very good shot), an informal strategy education, and a brief apprenticeship in magical theory. (She also turned 17.) She was sent back to her world by her teacher (England/Britain), however he messed up on his spell and sent her to the Black Butler world instead.
> 
> In the Black Butler world, Arya was forced to delve deeper into magical theorem to create her own spell to send herself home, as her teacher (England/Britain) could not help her on that score. She learned French, Greek, and Latin to assist herself to that end, as well as improved her gunmanship and tactical thinking. She more or less followed the manga plotline of Black Butler, which involves hijinks n' stuffs and is unimportant to this summary, but acquired a scar on her ear from a zombie fingernail and later befriended the German so-called witch called Sieglinde, teaching her the magic Arya learned in Hetalia and hooking her up to Arya's teacher England/Britain. The extremely clever Sieglinde broke through the troubles Arya was having with her spell, and Arya left the world of Black Butler, promising to eventually visit Sieglinde again, or at least make it possible for her to visit Arya.

_Arya's POV:_

**SPLASH**

**CRACK**

I felt the cool embrace of water close over my body, and abruptly let out my breath in shock and no small amount of pain as the back of my head cracked against what felt like stone not a second later, followed by the rest of my back a nanosecond afterwards. Luckily, whatever water I was in was shallow, so as I thrashed and sat up, coughing, gasping, and choking all at once (if that makes any sense), and losing my grip on the straps of my apocalypse bag into the bargain, I was able to do so without also continuing my drowning experience.

The second I could breathe without feeling water in my throat I groaned and clutched the back of my head, feeling it throb painfully. Thankfully, as I gingerly felt around, no blood was drawn and my skull remained un-dented. I would probably just have a monster of a bruise for the next few days/weeks.

Then I opened my watering eyes and looked around for my apocalypse bag, seeing it floating in the foot-deep water a few inches away. With a sigh of relief, I grabbed it and slung it over my shoulder again, taking the time to look around my landing site.

It appeared as if I was sitting in a decorative fountain in a city square or something, and my heart sank, because number one I knew there was no such thing in the town near my house, or any towns anywhere near my house, and number two I had no idea where I actually was, given that the architecture was…suspiciously funky for a real-life location. Skull motifs and wacky weathervanes were alarmingly common, and the roofs of the houses and the houses themselves were…skewed, in a way that didn't feel architecturally sound.

Perhaps it was just an artsy part of town. Perhaps I had landed in a very odd sort of festival. Perhaps this was an amusement park.

Perhaps I was desperately in denial.

At the moment, though, all I _did_ know for fact was that it was a very bright, very hot, and probably middle-of-summer day, and for once I was actually mildly _glad_ about being dumped in water. This particular occasion certainly beat being dumped in an ice-cold river in the middle of winter –an image and situation I couldn't help but long for, just for a second, as I squinted hatefully up at the sun.

At which point I froze, my eyes going wide, before I winced and closed them again, forcibly reminded that staring into the sun, no matter how cartoony and anime the world, hurt like a bitch.

_What. The. Fuck._

Everyone remembers when they were little and in kindergarten, and you drew a landscape for whatever childish reason, and you always drew the sun with one of two things: a happy lil' smiley face and/or sun rays, when you had never in your grubby crayon-grabbing life seen the _actual_ sun with anything like that? Hell, I remember that some of us would put shades on the damn thing, because there's nothing that four-and-five-year-olds like better than poetic irony.

Well the toddlers and kindergarteners of my world had a sudden basis in fact, because the sun I looked up at just now, while still throwing off as much light and heat as my native, beloved hydrogen-and-helium star, had everything except the ironic shades: flaring, conical rays that circled its entire –...body? Head? Self?– and a billion-watt smile that could put any comic book hero's to shame, gaping wide in amusement as faint laughter drifted down from the heavens. The sun had a _face_. A face that was _laughing_ , something intrinsically impossible in my home dimension.

Well _fuck_.

I didn't even bother to make sure there was no one around as I screamed in furious anger and cursed anything that seemed appropriate to curse, shaking my fist at the sky. I cursed my novice abilities in magic and I cursed my mentor for using a faulty spell that got me into this whole problem in the first place. I cursed the damn _Soul Eater_ sun for causing such damn hot desert temperatures in wherever the hell I was –Death City seemed a prudent guess– and I cursed the stupid fountain I landed in for almost breaking my head. For variety's sake, I cursed Medusa for being a bitch and a bad parent, because the lord knows Crona needed _someone_ to take his (I was going on _his_ until better notice) side and curse her out in his favor.

Once I was done cussing in English, I sucked in a deep breath and began spitting just about every Italian swear word and phrase I knew...which was, shamefully, quite a lot. The dude who taught me the language (who also happened to be an avatar/physical representation of aforesaid country –best way one could explain it out of _Hetalia_ context) was a rather large pottymouth, and pretty much the only stuff I ever retained from his lessons was a whole lot of ways to insult someone's mother and/or sex life in Italian...which was, uh…useful…I guess.

Usually it was only useful when I needed to relieve pain or express frustration, but hey, whatever works. That's what swear words are _for_ , really.

When I finally ran out of Italian, I was frustrated enough that I would have _liked_ to continue cussing in the other four languages I knew (being German, Latin, Greek, and French, roughly in order of fluency), but the fact remained that my knowledge of Latin and Greek was limited and for technical spellcasting only –so German and French were the only two that really lended themselves to cursing– and I was flustered and angry enough that I couldn't really remember anything but the main three curse words in either language. Which therefore made saying them over again, bilingually, rather redundant.

That and I was getting soggy –sure, I had dressed for the possible occasion of getting drenched, but the fact remained that my clothes were not entirely waterproof and neither was I.

So applying logic, I looked around and noticed that in my first actual spot of good luck for the day, no one had been around to see me scream and shake my fist at the sky, screeching curse words. So no one was around to watch a dripping wet blonde with a forced smile on her face (which consisted mostly of gritted teeth) as she flounced her way out of the awkwardly carved fountain –the stone curves of the edge were very inconveniently placed for someone trying to climb out of the fountain's bowl with a heavy rucksack in tow.

Standing on the cobblestones and feeling warmth drift upwards from them like an oven, I let my apocalypse bag swing down from my shoulder to rest on the pavement near my feet, before I straightened up again and started wringing out my hair.

 _Okay. Ideas._ I did _not_ want to be stuck in an anime, even one as interesting as _Soul Eater_ , for the rest of my mortal days. This situation definitely warranted a call to my magic teacher, Britain (who inhabited the same verse as Romano, my friend and Italian/curse word teacher), because I had felt _positive_ that the magical pentagram and ritual –which I'd spent _painstakingly long months on_ – that I had made would work. Britain had even okayed it when I turned my cellphone on and used some of its precious battery to send him pictures and a text of what I planned to draw and say, and he'd spent some thousand-and-fuck years as a practicing magician (and a pretty competent one at that).

My hair mostly dry, I pulled off my shirt, exposing my swimsuit top, and started wringing it out as little droplets of water spattered onto the hot paving stones, hissing and fading within moments. Of course, now that I was in a world that maybe had plug-in outlets, I could be a little more caviler about phoning him in for a chat. Back in _Black Butler_ , the world that I had just vacated mere moments ago, I hadn't had that luxury, and had to rely on the dubious texts and sources on magic provided in-verse. That isn't, of course, to say that magic in that world was hackneyed –it was just far more geared towards summoning magic creatures, literally ripping part of their power away, and then using it towards one's own nefarious ends. Britain didn't work like that and neither did I, and to hell (badum-tss) with it if I was gonna start then. _Real_ magicians worked by equivalent exchange –FMA had it more right than the fans in my world knew– and voluntary cooperation from both parties in the equation, or, if it was a good magician dealing with a bad creature, they killed it dead and didn't fuck about with half-crippling it, then expecting a happy little reunion when they crossed paths once again.

Honestly, it was no wonder Ciel hadn't (yet –the manga was still ongoing and whatnot, and the last thing I had read in _my_ world was the introduction to the arc with that one fortune teller and the music hall) ever encountered anyone with real magic to them, aside from Sebastian and the Grim Reapers. It was a source of personal bemusement to me that there were any humans left alive to practice any kind of magic at all, what with vengeful magical creatures chomping them left and right (deservedly so).

But, anyways. Logically speaking, given that Britain had approved of my attack plan and he had more magical experience in his eyelashes than I had in my whole body, this probably –potentially– wasn't a fuck-up on my part. (For which I was rather disproportionately glad. The first really major spell I had ever done, and I hadn't fucked it up. Yay me!) Ergo, this meant that, yet again, the universe had decided to screw me over in the most lengthy, time-consuming, and generally asshole-y way it could, by kicking me to yet another anime dimension instead of gracefully allowing me to make it home and wallow my days away in rustic splendor.

I knew my separation issues were getting bad, because when I missed my home, that was rock fucking bottom. The farm we owned probably hadn't changed in a hundred years, the town in fifty, and the people in eighty. Honestly, it was horrifying how bland my life was. My family traveled out of town twice a year, on Christmas and Easter, and that was it. That was my sum total experience of life up until about midway through 16, in which I most stupidly tried a spell to send me to another dimension and ended up in _Hetalia_. That was just over a year ago: I was seventeen now, older, hypothetically wiser, and with an infinitely bigger vocabulary and lack of clear skin. I knew what it felt like to be in a car crash and escape a sinking ocean liner, I knew what it felt like to stab someone in the chest and what it felt like to have your own throat cut. (Newsflash, it's painful, and very, very wet. Lots of liquid. Lots of blood. Not putting people off their tea, am I?)

Most importantly, I knew how to keep myself in shape, because I knew that unless my body was a lean, mean, fighting machine, that machine was going to be shattered into pieces by someone, somewhere, with an ax to grind. I knew how to cast a spell and how to reload and fire a gun into an encroaching horde of the mindless undead without being torn apart, or how to briefly tango with an experienced knife fighter and not end up dying for the privilege. I knew what it felt like to be tortured by a psychopathic madman with exquisite weapons expertise and I knew how to live in a house with a demon who had a chip on his shoulder against all magicians for nine months and avoid getting fucked over.

Oh yes, packed full of adventurous learning, I was. After all that (which was not even remotely a fully comprehensive list), even the most dewy-eyed and thrill-seeking of naïve and adventurous teenager protagonists would have been longing for some stolid rural laziness in a backwater town full of nonentities and nobodies, half of whom could drop dead on the streets without the rest of the others noticing, the place was so sleepy.

Problem being, I actually had to get to that fucking point. As recent events demonstrated, I was far from out of the woods yet. _Soul Eater_ was still a hurdle on my horizon, and, well, it was one I was gonna have to jump if I ever wanted to see Kansas again. (Okay I lived in Virginia, but like when else could you make that reference?!)

Since I was in a desert, completely drying myself off might not be the best idea, I thought as I pulled my shirt back on and then picked up my apocalypse bag –so named because I had originally playfully packed it with the intent to survive any disaster scenario I came across, and brought it along with me during my first disastrous spell attempt. After Britain had cast a spell of hammer-space upon it, this bag basically became my only worldly possession, and I had been living out of it for months.

Speaking of which, I should probably go find a bench or something and put on some socks, since there would possibly be quite a bit of walking in my near future.

Hoisting my bag over my shoulder, I looked around, taking note of the fact that the square I was in seemed to be filled with cafés, with a bunch of decorative plants in pots and ground boxes and spindly outdoor chairs and round tables gathered by the spacious ground-floor windows, frequently covered by some sort of arched awning. That was probably why no one was around –it wasn't the morning caffeine rush or the afternoon snack rush, and just from looking down the three roads that led into this square, I could see that the way into this square was twisting and complex, which meant it'd be hard for casual passersby to wander down this way.

Well, alright then.

I wandered over to the nearest café, pushing open the door and hearing the bell _tinkle_ as I did. Since the entire place was empty, I got prompt and immediate attention from the lady behind the counter, and I smiled tentatively.

"Uh," My eyes flicked over to the chalkboard behind her head, and I perked up a little. "-can I get some sweet tea? For a table outside?"

"Of course. Coming right up!" she chimed, and I smiled again before turning right back around to walk outside, sitting down at one of the cream-colored plastic chairs outside and leaning back with a sigh, letting my shakes recede.

_Ordering hasn't gotten any less scary, I see._

Setting my bag down on the ground, I reached inside and pulled out my money purse, opening it up and fishing around for some American bills. To the best of my memory, Death City was in Death Valley, Nevada (hence the scorching heat), but most of the money in my bag was British pounds and change from the year 1889, with a thick wad of bills tied incongruously together with a ribbon at the very bottom. I pulled out a ten-dollar modern bill, which should cover my drink with at least little bit left over, unless she left me a pitcher.

Carefully stuffing this inside my boys' swimshorts, which were already more damp than wet thanks to the incredibly bright sun and hot air, I closed my purse and put it back in the larger bag, reaching down nearly down to my elbow to find some socks, which I retrieved after a comedic few moments of rummaging.

Scooting out my chair a little, I kicked off my shoes and pulled my socks on one by one, managing to hastily scoot back in and at least hook my toes into my sneakers before the café owner (or possibly employee) walked back out, and I salivated a little at the golden glass of iced sweet tea she put down at my table, garnished with a lemon wedge, my eyes sparkling. It had been forever and a half since I'd gotten some good sweet tea, and I nodded to her gratefully as she smiled and walked back into the café, before seizing the glass and working very hard not to chug it straight as I took a long, savoring gulp.

_Oooooooh **boy** have I missed this._

Some of my irritation faded away: sure, I was going to call Britain and chew up him the fuck out, sure I had messed up and sent myself to another anime world, but like, what was the harm in stopping for a drink first? I could be touristy for like twenty minutes, and what a lovely experience it would be, having a drink in the actual Death City in _Soul Eater_?

The fact I hadn't gotten artificial flavoring or ice like this in nearly eight months was neither here nor there.

I was also fairly confident of being able to fix my problem fast –aside from any quick corrections Britain would make with the virtue of hindsight, this place had the Death Weapon Meister Academy, which had _Lord Death_ , a _god_ , and if he couldn't fix my problem, I was in more trouble than I thought. I could just skip up to the DWMA, get pointed to the Death Room, and lay out my problem, and since Lord Death was also a god of order, he'd probably be highly motivated to iron out this irregularity in five seconds flat.

Giving a quick glance around out of habit, since in _Black Butler_ whipping out a cellphone was grounds for an accusation of witchcraft, I slid down in my chair and unzipped one of the side pockets for my apocalypse bag, pulling out my phone with its Italian-flag casing and powering it on with one hand as I took another sip of my sweet tea, enjoying the chill.

My lockscreen flashed on, and I swiped into the dial feature, typing out Britain's number by memory and holding it to my ear. He picked up after only one ring.

_"Did it work?"_

"Does this sound like the voice of victory to you?" I deadpanned.

_"…Bollocks."_

"I know, right!? What went wrong?!" I cried into the phone, waving my free hand furiously. "You said it was fine!"

 _"It should have **been** fine!"_ Britain snapped, though his flash of anger didn't seem directed at me. _"There were no technical errors in that spell, and as you survived, clearly you performed it correctly! Are you **sure** you're not in your home world!?"_

"The sun has a face, dude. A face."

_"I'm sorry, WHAT?!"_

"Its _Soul Eater_. Uh, its another anime, a lot of things are weirdly anthropomorphized here. The moon has a face too. Lots of things are whimsical and not entirely restricted to one form."

_"You're sure of this?"_

"Dude, I know that face."

_"The sun's face."_

"The sun's face." I agreed, taking another sip. "That smiling, laughing face…"

_"I'm sorry, are you trying to make a mangled Batman reference or is the sun **actually** smiling and laughing?"_

"It's actually doing that. And you know what Batman is?"

_"Must you be such a brat?"_

"I must. Don't let America hear about it, though, or he'll hound you to the ends of the earth."

 _"Too late."_ he said, then sighed. _"Well, I confess that I am utterly bamboozled as to why the spell didn't work successfully. By all rights, you should be sitting in your home at this very moment."_

I groaned. "I was afraid you'd say that."

_"Do you have any plans?"_

"Uh, well, there's a god in this world, Lord Death, the Grim Reaper." I explained, leaning back in my chair a little. "He's hundreds of years old, and he's been fighting Witches –which are like an evil separate species from humans in this world– for just as long, so like, he should probably at least have an idea of what to do?"

_"I'm not very reassured by the fact he hunts magic-users."_

"Ugh, no, it's _Witches_ , not anyone with magic." I explained, rubbing my forehead. "Its like- they're always female, they live hundreds of years too, and their souls –souls manifest physically after people die here– are tangibly different than humans, corrupted or otherwise. He's not going to Reaper-Chop me just because I show up and have magic."

_"And you're willing to bet your life on that?"_

I hesitated. Britain's paranoia was somewhat contagious.

"Okay…maybe I don't roll up and explain that I'm a _magician_. I've got plenty of practice at dancing around it, thanks to my last world." I told him after a moment. "Unfortunately, that means I probably can't use magic to find the sigils like I did before, since they'd be able to track me down. I can check with the DWMA library though, its huge, and there's bound to be the kinds of books I need somewhere in there. I mean, its not like I'm trying to blow stuff up, I just need _reference books_."

_"That would probably be a wiser course."_

"I'm still gonna try to talk to him." I said stubbornly. "But no reason I can't do both. Uh, listen, there's probably outlets in this world, so I can call you back later, but for right now I've got to finish my iced tea and head up to the school."

_"YOU PUT **ICE** IN YOUR TEA-"_

I hung up on Britain before his outraged tantrum could go full-throttle, powering down my phone again before sticking it in my bag.

Draining my glass in one last gulp, I picked up my bag and stood again, entering the shop one last time to hand the lady the glass and pay for my drink.

"You know how to get to the DWMA from here?" I asked as I handed over my bill, and she hummed without looking up, tapping out my numbers on the old-fashioned cash-register.

"Deathbus 42, runs throughout the city to pick up students on their commute." she answered instantly. "The nearest stop is down Massacre Avenue, out in front of the Deathsteraunt. No fare for students, 1.50 for everyone else."

"R…right…" I said, sweatdropping a little. "Thank you, ma'am."

I accepted my change and headed out again, pulling my apocalypse bag over my neck to rest across my body diagonally rather than resting on one shoulder, scanning the three available streets before spotting Massacre Street and heading down it. I was still a little hung up over how macabre the naming conventions around here were, but then again, it _was_ Death City, and I could appreciate them making their aesthetic and sticking to it, come hell or high water.

Well, this was a desert, so high water wasn't very likely…it was hot out here. After all, Death Valley was called Death Valley in my world because this particular desert valley was one of the hottest places on the planet, with a record-setting 134 degrees Fahrenheit (56.7 Celsius) in the air one summer in 1913, and 210 degrees Fahrenheit on the surface in July 1972. Place was HOT.

Not as hot as I might've expected, though that may have been something to do with all the buildings and plants everywhere, or maybe the fact that Lord Death had inadvertently done something to the weather when he rooted his soul here. Either was possible with my level of science comprehension.

I saw the bus stop, which looked normal enough except for the familiar cartoonish skull plastered across it –three dark round holes for eyes and nose in a circular face, three white spikes sticking out from the bottom like stylized teeth that made up over half of the skull's length– and a funky-looking poster of what seemed to be a musician's album over one wall, as well as a large graffiti 42, and ducked under the small bit of shade from the overhang with a sigh of relief. Hopefully, I could get out of here soon, since I definitely wasn't used to a desert climate and would probably burn to a crisp if I stayed too long.

Waiting for the bus allowed me to dry off completely, as well as stick a dollar and two quarters in my pocket, ready to pay the fare the moment I had to, and agonize over the makeshift plans I had made. Would Lord Death not accept someone who used magic if I went to him for help? As far as I could remember it, there was no precedent for someone who had magic but wasn't a Witch in Soul Eater, aside from Blair and the other "Monsters" like Mosquito, both of which had transformative capabilities that I couldn't match. I walked like a Witch, talked like a Witch, and ergo I would probably get axed like a Witch if I waltzed up to the DWMA and stated my name and purpose.

Since I wasn't being swarmed with meisters right now, I could assume that my soul wasn't tangibly witchy, which was a sort-of-point to my favor, though I wasn't sure if that would stick around if I started actually using magic.

_Dangit._

Such plots continued to absorb me as the bus pulled up –it was a red double-decker just like in London, which gave me a momentarily double-take– and I got on, paying the driver and picking a seat near the middle. There were a bunch of other kids on the bus, ranging from my age to about middle-school age, most of them wearing some kind of school uniform with a skull motif tucked away somewhere, usually sitting in pairs on the wide bus seats. As one of the only ones sitting alone, I stood out, making me cringe guiltily and shuffle a little closer to the window.

_Guess this really is a bus meant for DWMA students. Makes sense, Maka and Soul have their own apartment –heck, don't all the EAT students live on their own? Getting everyone to school would be a hassle without some kind of bus system, and I guess it makes sense to also have it available to civilians, since they might have to come to the DWMA to ask for help._

My eyes slid sideways, watching some of the students glance at me with varying degrees of curiosity.

_But I don't think that's the regular thing. I'm also not looking nervous, so it wouldn't make sense that I was riding to the DWMA to ask for help._

Eh, whatever.

I sat back to enjoy the ride, watching with interest and amusement as Death City passed by. Despite the uniformity of it in the anime (something undoubtedly done to save budget) there was actually a lot of cultural mishmash in the streets we passed. Aside from the seemingly ubiquitous red-tiled rooftops and long square plastered buildings that seemed to make up residences, there were soaring domes and plazas and obelisks like I'd seen in Italy, and ten-story skyscrapers and other vestiges of modern cityscapes, and gardens for a dozen different climates, along with the Death-City-centric architecture that featured those improbable huge staircases to nowhere and a profusion of weird, whacky, and whimsical skull motifs –mostly versions of the same skull I'd seen at the bus stop, which was Lord Death's own mask– and twisted lines that made up the regular shops and buildings in the areas we passed.

Death City itself was constructed as a single large hill, rising up from the valley floor like a lonely mountain –from a distance it looked like nothing so much as a huge pile of buildings with the DWMA sitting in pride of place at the very top of it, though there was a spread of other buildings and streets on the level ground as well. The bus wound a complex route as it steadily climbed the slope of the city, sometimes driving in a slow curve upwards, other times ascending a brief sharp hike, stopping frequently for more students as if followed the rising, twisting, and turning cobblestone streets. Eventually it dropped us off at the bottom of the DWMA stairs themselves, flanked by the huge black tiered walls that cut the school itself off from the rest of the city and created an enormous peak for the DWMA proper to rest upon.

As I got out with the others, I noticed with interest that there was a small parking lot to the right of the stairs, mostly for motorbikes, though there were about a dozen spots for cars as well. Next to them, right up against the soaring wall itself, was a thick forest of occupied bike racks, indicating that not everyone bussed to school.

At the reminder, I winced and looked up the long, _long_ bank of snow-white stairs, which most of the other students were already ascending. Just from where I stood here, I could count over a dozen stories of flights of stairs, and since those flights were unfolding away from me as they went upwards, there was probably a dozen more that I couldn't see yet.

 _Oh boy._

_Don't they have an elevator or something?!_

_***Time Skip***_

The answer to that, apparently, was no, and an hour later by my watch –which wasn't set to _Soul Eater_ time (whatever that was) but could obviously still count– I was sprawled over the courtyard of the DWMA, slightly to the side of the stairs so that my collapsed body wouldn't be in the way of anyone climbing up.

_Holy Jesus fuck those are some long stairs._

After enough oxygen had re-entered my system and I was no longer experiencing climber's high, I groggily sat up, adjusting my bag a little to pull it closer to me and make sure no one had gotten any funny ideas about stealing it.

The spacious courtyard I was currently collapsed in was made of irregular yellowish stones cemented together, surrounded by a low black wall along the outside. The school itself rose above us, with several more tiers of courtyards rising upwards before three huge white skulls interrupted the pattern, facing the front of the school: the middle one had red needle-like spikes sticking upwards out of the nose and eye holes, and the spread of its three teeth was much wider, giving room for students to walk between them into the school. Flanking the three huge skulls were two squat black towers with red conical roofs, and sticking diagonally out of their bases were huge white candles, larger than the bus I had rode in on, somehow lit with enormous flames that were bigger than cars. Another four candles of equal size stuck out at regular intervals as they circled the school, and two slender black towers rose between them in the middle.

The central mass of the school was comprised of more black towers with red peaked roofs and rings of courtyards and balconies around them, mirrored against one another so that the whole school was symmetrically designed from the front. Three black orbs hovered above the very highest peaks of the school, and the negative space between them and the red spires of the roofs created the illusion of yet another Lord Death skull –which, of course, was also studded as a white mask near the top of every tower in the school.

Let it never be said they did not stick to their theme like glue.

Staggering upright and trying not to feel too awkward in what were very obviously swim shorts and a T-shirt, I made my way over beneath the teeth of the huge skull arching over the courtyard entrance, my legs practically whimpering as I climbed the meager three steps up onto the dais beneath said skull and walked into the school itself.

More teenagers of varying ages and uniforms strolled around, talking and chattering with each other, some with transformed Weapons over their shoulders or at their belts, and I shuffled a little and tried not to look too weird with my large rucksack and conspicuous lack of second person, especially since I was in essence lurking and waiting for someone to conveniently say something along the lines of _"Hey, I'm going down to the library for…"_

"Hey! You know you can actually wait five minutes before running off to the library again!"

 _Well, that works too._ I thought, deadpan, then began to trot after the suspiciously familiar voice.

Sure enough, I spotted Maka Albarn and Soul Eater arguing about half a hallway length ahead, with Soul insisting that she didn't have to immediately bury herself in books the second school was in session again and Maka telling him firmly that she had to check to see if they'd gotten anything new over break. Granted, I was seeing them from the back and through a crowd, but Maka's thin ash-blonde pigtails and the long black trench coat was a dead giveaway, as was Soul's spiky white hair and headband, along with his vaguely letterman-esque yellow and black jacket and maroon pants. From their arguing, I gathered I had arrived on the suspiciously convenient first day of school, which explained why I wasn't the only kid at the entrance looking confused and a little lost.

Thankfully, since they were talking rather loudly, I didn't have to actually keep Maka and Soul in sight and thus alert them to the fact they were being followed as I trailed after them through the surprisingly complex, near-identical hallways that led up and down and tilted occasionally in subtle directions, serving to further complicate any path a student might take. If you weren't careful, you might even end up in the bowels of the school… I felt a bit nervous about finding my way out of here after I checked in at the library.

Another pleasant bonus, the library was so huge that by the time I walked into it, Maka and Soul were already occupied. I didn't want to compound my problem by becoming memorable to the main cast, since that was just asking for trouble at this point. I mean, a basically-transfer student on the first day of a new school year at what was functionally a supernatural school, hooking up with the main characters?

Bad idea, unless I welcomed the implicit shenanigans. Which I did not.

The library itself was a huge, tapering cone-shaped room with story-high bookshelves on each level, with the levels above the ground floor accessed by a walkway ringing the edges of the room, accompanied by a metal railing on the other side to keep students from falling. More walkways bridged the diameter of the room on each new level, connected to a central turret, which at the ground floor held the librarian's main desk. There were skull-shaped glass lamps everywhere, though these were currently off, and as I looked up, walking across the floor, there were at least thirteen stories that I could count, indicating that this was probably located somewhere in the center of the school.

There were also stacks of books everywhere on the ground, some nearly as high as I was, as well as several divided study desks/cubicles with wall sconces and unlit candles in them, and a few more tables of a more open nature scattered about the room, which I picked my way through carefully.

"Uh, hi, sir." I said as I got to the desk where the librarian was, a guy in a uniform that reminded me oddly of an old-school bellhop, only all grey, with short frizzy dark hair and a toothbrush mustache. "Can I ask if we have any books about Witch languages and symbology?"

"Witch language and symbology?" he asked slowly as I nodded a little, trying not to sweat nervously. "Hmm, hmm. Not a common subject for a student: it's pretty advanced stuff. May I ask why?"

"Its for research." I said, which was true enough, my hands tightening a little on the strap of my bag. I was relying on social engineering here –this guy worked in the library of the DWMA, which was an independent facility not technically open to the public. Many of the students –most of them, actually– were the same age as me. This was a day for new students, and also with the hundreds attending at bare minimum, it seemed iffy that he would instantly recognize every one of them. Furthermore, if I _was_ someone who was up to no good, I'd probably be a Witch or a Kishin, both of which would be easily spotted long before they could get halfway up the stupid monumental steps.

In other words, plausible excuse + other options being unlikely + confidence = vindication.

The librarian sighed and clasped his hands, laying them atop the desk, which made me sweat a little more. Bad sign.

"Level 1 books are for students with 1-star and 2-star rank." he explained to me, speaking slowly, like I was a kid. "They cover a vast range of subjects both fictional and nonfictional, and as for nonfiction goes, I can assure you myself that they explain Witch culture and terminology as much as is safe for the student body. 3-star students may access Level 2, as it includes more sensitive and specific information regarding the various enemies of the DWMA. Anything beyond that is instructor's materials, which cannot be accessed by the student body regardless of rank, or the Level 4 materials, which have rare and dangerous manuscripts printed by Witches themselves, which for reasons of security as well as education, we cannot allow anyone but Death Scythes and certain meisters personally selected or given permission by Lord Death to access. I hope you can understand."

I understood, but that didn't mean I had to like it. Given as the books I probably needed were Witch products, the security on them would be insane, which meant I probably couldn't just jimmy a lock or something and walk out with them, never mind the fact that I didn't know which of the books I actually needed.

Well, diplomacy and decency having failed, I was going to have to try and talk to the manager.

"No problem." I said with a smile that was more of a grimace. "Thanks for your time."

_***Time Skip***_

Unsurprisingly, trying to find my way up (or was it down?!) to the Death Room was an absolute chore. Firstly because the actual location was never really _mentioned_ specifically, never mind how to get there, and secondly I was beginning to realize that whoever had designed these hallways, they had been made as deliberately confusing as possible, which I suppose was really cool from a training standpoint, but fucking frustrating when I was just trying to find my way around.

Conveniently, however, after I'd pathetically wandered down my dozenth hallway and felt the sympathetic, slightly pitying stares of the other students burn into my back, I spotted a cardboard cutout of Lord Death holding an arrow saying "This Way."

_Oh thank the gods._

I turned in the appropriate direction and moved a bit faster down the hallway, trying to seem like I belonged here and I absolutely knew what I was doing to fend off more of those awkward stares as I began to follow those signs, which led me further into the confusing maze that was the DWMA. Made sense, I guessed. Hadn't the Death Room been in one of the towers in the anime? It'd been such a long time since I'd seen it, I could barely remember the details of the plot, never mind the ambient two-second details, like what parts of the school went where.

Turning one last corner, I came to a dead stop, my expression falling. This short hallway was painted white with a wooden floor, and at the very end of it was a single wooden door with a slightly lopsided poster taped above it.

_Welcome, Welcome_  
New Students!  
Come on in!

I glowered up at the sign, then looked down and shook my head, angrily marching towards the door.

"If the universe is trying to tell me what I fucking think it is…it better not be." I muttered sourly under my breath as I walked. Was it too much to ask just for me to ask someone official for help?!

No, _oh_ no, apparently I had to jump through a hundred hurdles like some kind of weird European fairytale hero, just to prove myself worthy of the quest or something.

Pushing the door open revealed a smaller amount of people than I was expecting, which was weird when I vaguely remembered that the NOT class –the freshmen and others who weren't committed to hunting evil like the main characters in the EAT class– made up like 90% of the school. Then again…these were only the new students, right? It'd been over a year since I'd been in an actual school by the modern standard, so it was a bit hard to properly realize, but students didn't just graduate immediately. It took years, especially since the DWMA was also teaching combat lessons and so on outside of their normal curriculum. If they had one. They should have one, shouldn't they? Otherwise people like Maka and Blackstar, who had been practically raised here, wouldn't have a lick of common sense or basic education.

"Hey there. Meister, or Weapon?" another familiar voice asked, and I jumped a little and looked over, seeing Sid –pre-zombie, it was weird seeing him without blue-purple skin– standing behind a podium with a basket of small rectangular pins, like the name ones you'd see in a restaurant on waiters and waitresses.

"Oh, uh, I'm not really here for Weapon-" I began, only to be interrupted as he held one out.

"Pin this on your shirt, please."

I took it without thinking, and only when I looked down did I realize he'd handed me a meister badge.

_Shit._

Well, I didn't need to commit to this, this was fine. Just wait out the orientation or whatever and then ask for a mirror –I remembered the 42-42-564 chant, at least, so if I had a mirror I could get my mitts on Lord Death!

So thinking, I reluctantly pinned the badge to the corner of my shirt and stepped away from the desk as a flustered-looking girl with black hair –I think I recognized her vaguely from _Soul Eater Not!_ – shyly crept into the room.

I looked around as she accepted her meister tag, nervously picking at the corner of my own "meister" badge. Sid had gotten it all wrong, no way in hell was I a _meister._

Although…what were the qualifications, really? Combat skills? Oh bitch _please_. If that was all it took, I had this in the bag. I mean, just look at that loser Hiro –he was a meister too, and he was the wimpiest dweeb I'd ever seen. And meister-ing (was that the correct verb form?) was a lot different than being a Weapon, it didn't seem to be genetic.

Not wanting to give anyone any ideas in regards to starting up a partnership, I stood apart from the other students, watching them awkwardly. It had been a while since I'd interacted with people my own age, too: recently, it'd been a heavy dose of older (sometimes centuries older) people, predominantly male, and two extremely younger exceptions. I'd somewhat lost the ability to chat, and these people weren't my people. Even the students here were more or less younger than I was –most of them looked to still be in middle school, all desperately trying to look like something (cool, normal, emo, tough, goth: pick your poison) while simultaneously striving to make it look like they weren't trying at all and didn't give a crap about such petty concerns, whatever those petty concerns happened to be.

Ah, youth. Such an uncomfortable fucking time.

I then sighed imperceptibly to myself. _Well, what's the worst that can happen? I don't need to find a partner, so I don't really need to socialize with any of the students, and then when I don't find anyone maybe I can talk to Lord Death about-_

"Oof!"

I grunted as some jerk came barreling into me from outside the room, making me stumble and nearly fall, and whirled around with a glare.

"Hey, watch it!" I hissed angrily, and the guy behind me who had been in such a tearing rush instantly turned pink and took a step back.

He was close enough to my height that any differentiating between the two of us was moot, and, oddly enough, looked to be roughly the same age, which when you looked at the rest of the middle-school-level kids around us was pretty strange. His black hair was cut short and smooth but looked like it wanted to get spiky if he'd given it the chance, and a set of crimson barrettes held the right side of his bangs behind his ear, with the rest was clumped between his eyes or parted off to the left side of his head. A black hat –possibly a fedora, I didn't know– was pulled low over his head, and he was wearing a snappy, dark suit that clung pathetically to his skinny, slender frame like he had been drenched in water, with a thin red checkered tie done neatly at his throat. He also had fine, classy-looking glasses perched before eyes nearly as dark as his hair, and a stud piercing in each ear, with both the glasses and the piercings a dark metallic black.

All in all, he looked like a cross between gothic punk and nerdy pianist –leaning towards the pianist.

"I-I-I'm _so_ sorry!" he blurted as I took all this in with a quick glance, quickly backing away further and holding his hands out in apology. His somewhat light and airy voice didn't crack, which I half expected, and any withering comment I might've made was cut off by the teacher.

"So that's everyone. I'm Sid, school staff. We called you here together so we could get a good look at you. Each meister and Weapon will get partnered up with someone, but there's no need to rush your decision. Take your time and find a partner who truly suits you."

He cast a look in my direction at that one, making me blink and try to smooth over my stormy expression. The last thing I wanted was to get in trouble with any teachers before I started asking about Witch stuff!

"If you have trouble finding a partner here or can't decide, there's a bingo tournament this weekend where we'll be holding a "feeling partner" game that will help you. As a matter of fact, I met my current partner at just such a game. What can I say? I'm not the most social guy."

I blinked a bit at this new piece of Sid trivia. I'd watched _Soul Eater Not!_ a long time ago, obviously, but I only really remembered that there was a trio of main girls in a meister-meister-Weapon partnership and they killed Medusa and Arachne's little sister.

Sid lifted a stack of papers from the podium.

"I'm going to hand out some sheets with a rough outline of what's coming up on the schedule. Take one and pass them towards the back."

I took one as the stack came to me and immediately started reading as I passed the rest on to the next person. Ah…apparently there _was_ an actual school curriculum alongside the "learning how to be a Weapon-meister pair" stuff, though most of this first week appeared to be geared towards settling us into our dorms –there was a disclaimer that all first-years had to live in the dormitories, which were divided up into male and female facilities– and hopefully setting up our partnerships.

"You've had an easy start of it today, but school starts at 7 AM tomorrow, and we expect you to arrive promptly." Sid began, making me look up. "This is the DWMA, and we are a school for heroes. Tax funding from all over the world help us provide the facilities needed to train meister and their Weapons in order to maintain world order. We're frequently known as international government workers, and because of that, even in the NOT class, we expect discipline, enthusiasm, and strict adherence to the rules. This week, we'll be focused on giving you the academy agreement and making sure you understand it: your final decision is due by Friday, at which point you'll be given your student ID card. Turning in the academy agreement prior to Friday will also allow you to grab your ID card."

There were various muted noises of concern or annoyance at that. Sid's eyes tracked slowly over the room.

"If you don't understand the agreement, a lawyer and translator are available for student use: their contact numbers are at the bottom of your sheet. I'd advise you to go over the agreement document thoroughly, since it is legally binding and deals with your relationship between the DWMA and the folks you encounter, as well as any funerary expenses or plans you have to make. This isn't just any other school: merely by being a student, even a NOT student, you have responsibilities that you agree to perform merely by signing that document. Am I clear?"

There was a murmur of agreement from everyone in the class.

Sid fished under the podium again, picking up another basket full of thin envelopes.

"Once of those responsibilities is the spending of your weekly allowance. You'll get it paid in full every Monday, no questions asked, but if we find out you've been mishandling it, especially for criminal activities, there'll be consequences. Take one envelope and pass the basket around."

The basket began to make its rounds, and I plucked my own envelope out, making as if to tuck it into my cleavage before I remembered that didn't work with the construction of this outfit and quickly lowering it instead, tucking the envelope inside one of my apocalypse bag's pockets instead.

_That's going to take some getting used to._

Sid waited until the basket had been emptied and made its way back to him, sticking it back under the podium where it belonged.

"The rest of the hour will be devoted to getting to know your fellow students. Remember, you'll be working with each other for the rest of your time here at the DWMA, even if you don't partner up, so try to make a good impression."

We all looked at each other sidelong.

"Please stand in two circles, meisters inside, weapons outside." Sid said briskly, indicating with one hand as he surveyed the various students. "Alright, now everybody step three people to the right and introduce yourselves. Get to know each other!"

I winced at the raised voice and stepped three people to my right. The weapon I came face to face with was freckled and female, possessed of an extraordinarily cheery personality.

"Hi, I'm Karen!" she said happily, holding out her hand. I shrugged and took it, giving her a firm handshake.

"Nice ta meet you. I'm Arya, Aryana Thompson." I said politely, and she beamed.

"So, you're a meister, right? Any practice with a particular weapon?" she asked enthusiastically. It was only then that I noticed some of the people around us transforming, or trying to, anyway.

I hurriedly returned my gaze to Karen. "I've shot a gun a time or two, chopped a knife around a bit, and a friend of mine taught me the basics of swordsmanship, but that's just about it." I said honestly, and she pouted a little.

"I'm a shuriken, or my family is anyway, I can't quite transform yet, so I guess we wouldn't work too well. Nice to meet you though!" she told me as she regained her cheerful smile, and then we switched off again. I met and chatted with a few other weapons, all of whom seemed enthusiastic or at least motivated by the whole deal. None of them could fully transform, and I realized with a sinking heart that if I was going to take the long way around and partner with someone to make them a Death Scythe, the books I needed were getting further and further out of my reach.

"Wh- _you_!"

As we switched off again, I came face to face with the same guy from before, who quickly regained his pink-faced nature and looked at the floor. In retrospect, the shock from my statement was rather redundant, since, after all, I had seen him come in and form a line with the other weapons.

"U-um, hello." he squeaked awkwardly. "I-I'm really, really, really sorry about the whole thing at the door." he added meekly, seemingly finding his own shoes to be suddenly fascinating as he tied his fingers into various intricate and apologetic knots. I eyed him grumpily, but it was kinda obvious that he hadn't meant to bump into me in the first place, and I sighed and extended my hand.

"Aryana Thompson, but most people call me Arya. You?" I asked with grudging politeness, and he looked alarmed and quickly grabbed my hand.

"I'm Rex. Rex Rayner." he said hurriedly, shaking my hand nervously. I slipped it out of his grip and faced him with a raised eyebrow.

"Rex Rayner, huh? Sounds like a biker name." I said skeptically, and he turned pink again.

"I-I can transform, see?" he blurted abruptly, stuttering in his eagerness to avoid our previous subject, and I blinked as there was a bluish flash and a soft "clunk".

Then I stared at the giant rectangle of steel embedded in the wooden floor. "You're a buster sword?" I said in disbelief, gazing blankly at the leather-wrapped handle, which stuck out from the larger width of the blade like the stick of a lollipop. _Who the hell can wield one of those? No, scratch that, who can even pick it up?_

Rex appeared on the blade as he sensed my obvious skepticism, looking anxious. "Try? Pleeease?" he begged pitifully, even going so far as to clasp his hands together. "I'm really light for my size, I promise."

I glanced around the classroom in the hopes of finding another person to switch off with, but Rex interrupted me again. "Listen, nobody ever wants to even try, so could you please pick me up, or, or something?" he pleaded desperately, and I gave him a look.

"Fine." I muttered with a grudging sigh, wrapping my hands around the leather grip. "But I still say that you're way too freaking heavy for me to…"

I blinked as I pulled him out of the floor, and stopped lifting with the tip a few inches above the ground, standing motionless for several seconds. "…hold." I finished dumbly, staring at the tapering, four-foot long, six-inches wide, one-inch thick length of metal. This was not physically possible: he should weigh upwards of 200 pounds, but here I was holding him up like it was nothing. I mean, yes, the buster sword was heavier than any weapon I'd ever held before, but it was...barely manageable. More like ten or twenty pounds.

Calculations were already starting to whirl through my head. Rayner seemed like a bit of a pushover, so once I made him a Death Scythe I could probably easily convince him to get me a few books from the library, as a favor between partners, you know? Besides, with most deadly weapons, heavier is better. I could learn to hurl this guy around, no problem. Yeah…some specialized weight training, and maybe I could use the levitation spell if nobody was looking.

If the universe was going to bitch-slap me all over again, I had a backup plan in the form of the long way around, which was at least a tried-and-true method of actually getting my hands on the books –talking to Lord Death, after all, was only a step to that, and if I was having such trouble already, it might take months. And if I was going to take months to get what I needed…I may as well make myself useful in those months.

I could make this work.

"So…Rayner." I said slowly, looking down at the blade and finally lowering it so the tip rested on the floor, my wrists aching. "I believe we can make this work."

He flashed onto the flat of the blade, looking shocked. "Y-you really think so?!"

I gave him a friendly smile. "I know so."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: June 19th, 2020  
> Originally Posted: June 19th, 2020, 3.40 PM USA Central Time


	2. Move-In Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone asked if I have an update schedule, and the answer is no, not really. My update schedule is something that bears a suspicious resemblance to a roulette wheel, which I'm sure everyone can tell if you take a gander the timestamps on the last fic. Or any of my fics. To be brutally honest, saying I have a schedule, like, AT ALL is a bit much. I write when I have the inspiration to write, and what's most important to me when I write is A) delivering a specific, usually preplanned amount of content per chapter, and B) ensuring the content is of good quality and, generally, as plausibly canon as I can make it outside of my obvious artistic licenses. Delivering content on a regular basis, like every other Tuesday or whatever, forces me to conform to a time constraint, and some chapters are longer than others. (Longest I ever hit was 15,000 words, I think. Oof.) This means that inevitably, at some point, I would have to either rush content or delay it, two things that would disappoint my readership and make me stressed and unhappy. This way, every time I update it's a pleasant surprise for you and a satisfying event for me, and unless I drop off the face of the earth for another two years, everybody's happy.
> 
> The current mitigating factors for this fic specifically is that there's a lot of small but important lore details in _Soul Eater_ , which I have to check over before I publish, and I kinda burned myself out just the teensiest bit trying to get the prior fic finished before my birthday, and I'm also working on the embroidery for my RenFest costume before our 50th anniversary season (hopefully) opens in August. And embroidery, for those who've never done it, takes a SHIT LONG TIME TO DO.
> 
> So things will definitely be slow starting out, but as the fic progresses, hopefully I'll pick up the pace. I'd say you guys should probably expect somewhere between one and two chapters a month at this point, which will hopefully pick up more towards a chapter every two weeks or so once I get into gear.
> 
> Also literally everyone (but one) who reviewed so far, ON BOTH SITES, has never seen _Soul Eater_ , but are like maybe willing to try this for my sake, and that is the sweetest thing I've ever read. I'll try not to disappoint you guys, and also describe things a little more! (I even went back and edited the first chapter in that direction, since that was also written at the end of my burnout and I wasn't all that proud of most of the stuff I wrote.)
> 
> Also, many of these exposition/setup chapters will tend towards the longer ends, because I really painted myself into a corner with my idea for chapter titles and my momma might have raised an aesthetic-thirsty fool, but she didn't raise a quitter. You know the useless lesbian joke? I'm a useless asexual, and my kink is characters having a gorgeous theme and sticking to it through thick and thin. Like RWBY? Hello, yes, I am WEAK. (For disclaimer purposes I should note Arya never goes to RWBY because it does not fit into my overarching plot for her.)
> 
> Yes I have an overarching plot. No it is not "make Arya suffer"…mostly.

_Arya's POV:_

The feeling of Rex writhing and warming in my hand as he transformed back to normal was…going to take some getting used to, and I not-quite-flinched and immediately dropped the hand I was holding as he regained human shape. It was…instinctively weird, since I couldn't remember the last time I'd even shaken hands with someone, so _that_ was going to take some getting used to as well.

"So…where you from?" I asked, rubbing the back of my head and trying to counteract the unintentionally rude message of whipping my hand out of his like he had rabies.

"Oh, um." Rex blinked and shuffled as we pulled away from the line like some of the other aspiring pairs were doing, nearly as awkward as I was. But he inhaled and recovered his courage almost immediately as we got to the wall, starting off on a response so automatic I had a feeling it was somehow scripted. "My family's been living in Death City for generations, we're hereditary Weapons. Mostly swords and blades. I came to the DWMA when I displayed my Weapon powers at 13, I've been looking for a meister ever since."

I blinked. "How old are you?"

"E-eighteen. My birthday was a few weeks ago."

There was a pause as he looked away, avoiding my eyes. An eyebrow slowly rose into my hairline. "And you haven't found a meister in five years?" I asked him, trying not to include any incredulity in my voice.

Rex winced. Palpably.

_Oookay, that's definitely some icky sticky drama that I probably don't want to get involved in._

"Uh, anyways, my name's Arya Thompson, as mentioned prior. Don't call me anything else if we wanna be comfortable with each other –I use Arya almost exclusively because that makes it seem marginally less like my parents were some weird creepy Neo-Nazis."

Wait, were Nazis even a _thing_ in _Soul Eater_?! What historical period was this set in? Wouldn't Lord Death have sent the meisters down on them like a ton of bricks the second they even _thought_ of getting genocidal!?

"I ran away from home almost two years ago," I said hastily, knowing that any brief moment of confusion would be quickly offset by the alarm of hearing someone admit _that_. "-and I've been on the road ever since. I turn eighteen this October, and I'm here to make a Death Scythe."

There. Nice and ambiguous, but still with enough personal information to start someone off with. I didn't mention where my home was, why I left, where I'd been since then, or why I'd come to the DWMA, leaving me with a nice amount of wiggle room later, if and when I needed to adjust my backstory. The only concrete information Rex, or anyone, had at this point was the fact that I was essentially probably homeless and seventeen years old, and also probably from somewhere in America due to my accent.

Rex had also provided me with a few key tidbits in turn. He came from a Weapon family that lived in Death City, which meant his allegiance was firmly and possibly even fanatically in the DWMA camp, and he also probably had at least some small amount of cultural and social training in being a Weapon/DWMA student, since I seemed to remember attending the academy –for long enough to learn to control their ability at least– was mandatory for anyone with manifested Weapon genes. Having been kicking around the NOT class for five-ish years, he was definitely an experienced student, which meant he personally knew his way around the school and around student life. He was also older than me by a few months, but as of yet that didn't really signify.

All in all, I could do worse for a partner.

"W-why'd you run away?!" Rex asked with his eyes wide with alarm, which was the expected response to such a statement, unfortunately. I shrugged with one shoulder and fished for an excuse.

_Be vague, be vague. Don't commit to anything and you can still change your backstory around later if you need to._

"Eh, well."

I shifted a little from where I was leaning against the wall.

"Y'know. Things happen."

_Ah yes, nailed it. Nobody would ever consider such an "explanation" suspicious at all._ I thought with a subtle twitch of my eyebrow.

"W-wow." Rex stammered, but this time he seemed to trip over his tongue from _awe_ , not anxiety. His grey eyes were still wide when I glanced over in surprise, but now they were shining too, and he was looking at me like I was some kind of action hero.

_On the other hand, maybe my erstwhile partner's an idiot who'll eat up whatever I throw at him._ I thought with another, less aggrieved twitch of my brow. _I could **definitely** do worse than this guy._

"So do you have an apartment that we'll be sharing or what?" I asked, tapping the pocket of my bag where the paper Sid had handed out resided. "I mean, first years like me are supposed to be in the dormitories, aren't we? Or are you still in the dorms?"

"Still in the dorms." Rex admitted, looking at the ground again and reaching up in what seemed to be a nervous tic to fiddle with one of his stud earrings.

"Eh, cool." I said with a shrug, gently jogging him with one of my elbows in an effort to instigate a feeling of comradeship. "At least this way one of us doesn't have a place leagues above the other."

"The girls' dorms are way better than the boys." Rex mumbled, eyes still downcast and still fiddling with his earring.

_Mooootherfucker, I'm trying to carry a conversation here!_ I wailed in my head. Rex didn't look any better, especially when a sudden blink seemed to bring the realization that he'd been the one to start it floundering.

"Uh, but w-we can apply for an apartment the semester after we join EAT regardless of year!" he added hastily. "Would that be cool with you?"

"Sure." I agreed, relief washing over me. "I've been in dorm situations before, and it's like…okay, but having my own place would be cool. Eh, own place plus one."

Rex smiled shyly and stopped toying with his earring.

"Rent is usually $200 per month." he said, making me do a double-blink and straighten up from my lean against the wall.

"Seriously?!"

Granted, I'd never lived on my own in modern times, but that sounded like it was missing at least one digit, even if it _was_ student housing. Actually, if it was college student housing, it was probably missing more than one digit.

"Well, they don't charge us anything for living in the dorms." Rex said with a reasonable shrug. "Students get a monthly income of $1,200 from the school through our allowance, discounting any jobs we pick up, but we're the ones that buy our own food and any other necessary products, so it evens out, more or less. And apartments are almost always jointly paid by partners, so really its only like $100 per month, and we can arrange for them to take that out of our weekly allowance, so the payments are automatic."

"You seem to know a lot about it for a guy that lives in the dorms." I said with a smirk, and he offered me a sheepish grin.

"I had a partner before…"

_DRAMA DANGER DRAMA DANGER DRAMA DANGER DRAMA DANGER!_

"That's nice." I said tightly, my voice heightening. "We cool now? I mean, with having me as your partner?"

"Y-yes!" Rex squeaked, displaying the same tension I felt as he shuffled busily and looked any direction but me, rubbing his hands together for no discernable reason. "Cool. Super cool! Its fine!"

We both laughed in unison, trying to replace nervousness with humor, or at least drown it out. I was pretty sure we wouldn't have fooled a blind rabbit with our awkward laughter, but neither of us was going to call each other out on it.

"Soooo…" I said as our hasty, awkward laughter petered out. "We between semesters right now?"

"A-a little." Rex said, tugging at his stud again. "Generally speaking, we run to the Japanese system of schooling, with the year beginning in April and the first semester ending in July. This is the summer provisional orientation for the NOT students –you know, Normally Overcome Targets."

"I'm aware." I said, deadpan. I _still_ didn't get that acronym. Who called their student body targets?!

"The Japanese system isn't the only one in the world, after all, so people who transfer in between years or grades will have to show up, well, now, or at other points of the year. The fall semester starts at the end of our orientation week, but the school's already open for EAT students and so are the dorms." Rex finished. "Are you between, uh, years right now?"

I thought back to the last time I was in school, which was at the beginning of summer (although not this summer) several months ago. It was a private college for British nobility, and I had infiltrated it as part of an undercover spy mission for my pint-sized, eyepatch-wearing boss, Ciel Phantomhive. Given as my brief few months there had begun in stupefying, out-of-date educational boredom and ended in a zombie tea party, I didn't think it counted as a traditional school year.

"I haven't been to proper school since I was sixteen." I told him with a shrug, which was true enough. "Honestly, I just kinda…showed up, today."

Also true, and potentially criminal. Could you be charged with fraud if you tried to enter the DWMA illegally/without paperwork?

Hmm. Problematic. Then again, nobody had questioned my credentials thus far, which was kinda dumb given how many unknown enemies the DWMA had. When any mook off the street could become a Kishin Egg by virtue of enough soul-devouring murder, it would be ridiculously simple for said mook to sneak into the one institution dedicated to hunting them down and, I dunno, murder as many of the people there as they could.

Then again…a number of meisters had the ability to see souls, which included the violent, red fluorescing aura that wrapped in bubbles around Kishin Eggs and other wicked souls. Presumably any one of said meisters would sound the alarm ages before an infiltrator could cause damage.

_Then again_ …Witches, at least, could disguise themselves with the Soul Protect spell. Damn it, why did this all have to be so complicated?!

"Uh, do we need documentation or anything aside from the agreement we're supposed to sign?" I asked sheepishly, scratching the back of my head. Shameful as it was to take advantage of preconceived assumptions, playing the part of ignorant unschooled clod tended to work out in these situations, especially when I was from Virginia. Granted, that only worked with people who understood the (largely incorrect) cultural implications of the Appalachian and Southern accent of American English, but when it _did_ work, oof.

I was also a blonde chick, so…eh. I'd take the negative assumptions for once if it meant I wouldn't get thrown in fraud jail or whatever it would be.

"Do you…do you have a passport?" Rex tried.

"Nope."

"Driver's license?"

"A-nope."

"…birth certificate?"

"You know, I'd love to find out."

A gloom cloud briefly enveloped us. I wasn't even lying: I had a _fake_ passport, labeling me as Ari Thompson, that Romano had gotten for me when we'd been sneaking around in the _Hetalia_ world and that I'd continued to use for the heck of it throughout my travels there. And of course, in _Black Butler_ , passports weren't really a thing, much less viable modern ones.

And as for my driver's license, I'd been sixteen when I'd left my world, so I'd already gotten my learner's permit and was working through the complex red-tape nonsense involved with getting my _actual_ license when, well, wormhole shenanigans ensued. In _Hetalia_ I'd been too busy trying not to die to apply for the actual license, and it was 1889 in _Black Butler_ , so no cars. Hence, I was still license-less.

And of course the good lord only knew where the heck my birth certificate was in my world. Probably in some safe somewhere, or a security deposit box. I didn't actually _know_ , since while multi-world traveling was excellent for life skills like problem-solving, strategy, enculturation, historical nerdery, independent living, and language studies, it was much less excellent for things like socially-necessary paperwork, licenses, the education system and its attendant knowledge, and the broad spectrum of legally-centered knowledge loosely described as "life skills."

Like, sure I knew how to drive, but it'd been long enough that I wasn't at all comfortable getting behind a wheel anytime soon. I didn't know how to pay any bills, and while I had a vague notion of budget management, I didn't really have an acute understanding of how to deal with the distribution of a proper income. I didn't know how to pay or file taxes. I didn't know how to get a passport or any other kind of legal documentation.

So yeah, in stating that I'd basically been itinerant this past year and slightly-less-than-a-half, I was neither wrong, nor lying, nor exaggerating. My highest level of real education was sophomore high school, which for non-Americans was my tenth government-mandated schoolyear out of twelve, since I'd chucked myself into an alternate dimension in the summer break midway between sophomore and junior year. Statistically speaking, I was far behind my peers at this point, which wasn't exactly the fun-est of feelings.

"Um, we can go down to the legal department, and I think you'll be fine if you have a good background check." Rex said nervously, tugging on his earring again.

"Thanks dude." I said with a winning smile, feeling a bit like a manipulative jerk. Rex seemed like a genuinely nice guy, and here I was misdirecting him and sort-of-kind-of-deliberately-on-purpose leading him on with a false premise for my own benefit.

_So this is what being a gold-digging bitch feels like._ I thought vacantly, looking up at the ceiling. _I don't like it._

Sid whistled a little to bring us out of our respective conversations, and we all looked over.

"That'll be a wrap for today." he said over the dwindling murmur of talk. "You're dismissed. For new students, remember how long it took for you to get up the stairs today and factor that into your calculations for your morning tomorrow. If anyone's decided on their partnerships, please come up and have a word with me before you leave."

Rex and I exchanged looks, and I nodded firmly.

We pushed off the wall as the other new students began to file out of the room, waiting politely for three chicks ahead of us to speak with Sid, two in the typical schoolgirl fuku with brown and black hair respectively, and another with a prim blouse that contrasted oddly with her bouffant afro. As we ambled towards them, I caught the flash of Sid's dark eyes again, and experienced a brief moment of worry. Was there something off about me? I mean, I was in a thinly-disguised summer outfit comprised of swimsuit shorts and a T-shirt, which wasn't exactly school-appropriate, but this school was in a desert and also had no set dress code. Was it the fact I didn't belong in this universe? I hadn't signed up for the right stuff to sign up?

Frantic question marks were buzzing around my head as Rex and I stepped up, and I tightened my grip on the strap of my apocalypse bag.

"Rex and…"

"Arya Thompson." I said, anxiety churning in my stomach. Sid nodded slowly and rubbed his chin.

"And the two of you want to be partners?" he said, briefly glancing up from his clipboard before looking back down again. Something in the way he tapped his pen indicated an emotion I wasn't comfortable with, concern or irritation –there was a frisson of tension there that was unnatural and uncharacteristic for a teacher.

"Yeah." I answered as Rex bobbed his head in the affirmative.

There was a brief pause as Sid inhaled slowly.

"On the first day?"

His gaze rose again, something opaque there. My eyes slid sideways, and I stiffened as I realized Sid hadn't been casting glances at me, he'd been casting glances at _Rex_ , who'd been behind or beside me most of this time. Well, alternating glances between the two of us, but since he started with Rex and ended with me, it was obvious where his concern lay.

_Shit, what drama have I landed in the middle of now?!_

Rex Rayner wasn't a canon character in _Soul Eater_ , not as far as I knew, so why was Sid, who _was_ canon enough to be in both the story and the prequel, invested in him, especially to the point of concern?

I ticked back everything I knew of Sid. When the Star Clan had been raided and destroyed by the DWMA, he took Blackstar in and raised him nearly as a son. He was considered to be a good teacher by every character who had something to say on the subject, including Maka. He'd even given advice on their teamwork to the people that were trying to kill him one time, which was educational dedication if I'd ever seen it. Students and teachers liked and respected him on a universal basis.

He didn't kill anyone on missions unless he had to, but when he did, it was swift and brutal, which was fitting, considering his partner was a combat knife. He was a three-star meister, which by DWMA ranking meant he was the most skilled and powerful, the elite of elite, able –and this I knew from experience watching the anime– to fight off multiple opponents even without his partner or accustomed weapon. He'd beat the tar out of Maka and Blackstar with only an uprooted tombstone, and for all his loudmouthed idiocy, Blackstar was still the most combatively powerful student in the DWMA, no arguments.

Considering he'd also been _willing_ to do that –tricking his students that is, even if it was for their ultimate benefit– Sid was definitely the type of guy to follow the orders Lord Death sent down without question of qualm. He was professional, caring, and paternal, which meant any concern for Rex was probably less in the neighborhood of _'This is an antichrist child or something that threatens the school'_ and more _'Lord help this poor boy when I cannot.'_

Which was good, I guess, but then again…I wasn't sure if I was comfortable with the implied drama that had warranted such concern.

"Yes on the first day." I said firmly, reaching over to gingerly clap my hand on Rex's shoulder, since I wasn't altogether used to like…actual sustained human contact between me and another person, and also I hadn't asked permission for touching. "We like, clicked, dude."

Not the most professional way to phrase it, but even as I winced and readied myself to add another comment, Rex spoke up beside me.

"I'm alright with this, sir." he said respectfully, shifting a little but seemingly fine with the hand on his shoulder. "I think we can make it work."

Sid nodded slowly, and seemed to relax. "Alright then. See the two of you tomorrow."

I took my hand off Rex's shoulder and we left with a happy goodbye.

"So," I began as we went off down the hallway. "Paperwork?"

A shudder seemed to go through Rex. "Um…yeah. Don't take this the wrong way, but do you…do have any, um, anything?"

"Like ID and stuff?" I asked. He nodded. "Nope. Not a scrap of it."

Rex sighed. "Then this is going to take a while. Well, we can go to Medusa's office-"

I screeched to a halt. It was a close thing, but I even managed to keep myself from taking that a step further and going in the opposite direction as Rex continued for a bit, then blinked and hastily turned.

"Arya?"

What was the best way to explain to your oblivious companion that his nurse was an evil mad scientist of a Witch in disguise and you would rather split your skull open with an ax than go to her medical office?

"She the school nurse?" I asked, trying not to seem obviously, well, suspicious.

"Um…yes?" Rex blinked.

"Can't we see a doctor? Like a regular, graduated doctor with a PhD and stuff? I'd feel way more comfortable that way. Can we do that? I'd love to do that. I'd really rather prefer that."

I was babbling here and not ashamed of it. In terms of personal safety, Medusa wasn't that scary at this point: she was at the DWMA in disguise, and she wasn't going to break her cover with nefarious nonsense over one random student. What _was_ scary was the fact that Medusa was sneaky and smart enough to play multiple major global organizations against one another flawlessly, and planned out her moves weeks, even months, sometimes years in advance –and every plan had a counter-plan and at least three contingencies. Medusa didn't have Plan A and Plan B, because that implied the existence of only 26 plans. She had plans A-Z for Contingency 1, 2, 3, and onwards, and about three different diabolical plots on the boil at any given time, with forward-reaching consequences that could shatter nations. Give her a micrometer and she took twenty miles.

For example's sake, Medusa had publicly unleashed the original Kishin, aka the biggest force of evil this world had ever known, from underneath the DWMA where he was imprisoned, then strutted her smug ass back here a little bit later and gotten the DWMA to _actively help her_ with an effortless mixture of blackmail, coercion, and bribery.

So yeah, I was not even remotely comfortable with the idea of going to her office and submitting to a medical exam, since there was a decent chance Medusa would somehow be able to wrangle an inescapable favor out of it in the near-far future.

Also, for what she did to Crona, I wasn't altogether certain I'd be able to resist the urge to try and bury a scalpel in her eyeball, regardless of my own goals and maintained cover. Say what you will about shitty anime parents, most of them didn't replace their kid's blood with a malignant entity, treat them as a science experiment, and chuck them in a dark room for days on end without food or water –and with the aforementioned malignant entity being very, very cranky with said kid.

And also force the kid in a grueling training regime designed to shape them into an apocalyptic destroyer god, ruthlessly strip away their feebly gained support network of friends, and openly admit that their kid meant nothing more to them than a failed experiment, but that was more par for the course with evil anime parents.

"Uh, I guess we can go to an independent doctor." Rex said, blinking in surprise. "We'll have to go down the steps, though."

Mountainous bitch-climb or not, I did not hesitate. "Let's go!"

__

_***Time Skip***_

"The heck do I do with my blood type?" I asked aloud as the bus chugged along the cobblestone street, and Rex leaned over in the seat beside me. He'd gotten the relevant paperwork on our way out of the school, and I was currently filling out the stuff I could on the way to the doctor's office, such as name and various appropriate colors –eyes brown, hair blonde, etc.

"If you don't know absolutely for sure, just leave it blank." he said with authority. I clicked my tongue in acknowledgement as I scanned down the list.

It was mostly standard stuff, and the extra twists were, I presumed, due to the fact that the DWMA had a lot more qualifications and responsibilities than normal schools. It was, at least in part, a military academy, and also just international. The people needed to know what kinds of vaccinations and so on that you'd had in your home country, and there was a worrying statement about a placement test that assessed where I was on various ordinary school subjects like history, math, science, etc.

Since this wasn't my world to begin with, I had a very gloomy feeling about the history part of the test, and I wasn't much more sanguine about the rest of it, since again, formal schooling and I had been on the outs for quite some time now.

The physical test was less worrisome, though it was still concerning, because there was a sharp distance between exercising for personal fitness and survival and the unmitigated hell of American physical education.

A tangible shudder traveled throughout my entire being, and I reached out and grabbed Rex by the collar without looking away from my informational sheets.

"This physical test they talk about here. Does it involve," Deep inhale. "-the pacer?"

"The what?" Rex blinked, seemingly and rather oddly okay with me holding him by the collar of his undershirt like I was trying to shake him down for money.

"Pacer. Beep test. The unholy satanic sprinting module."

"Uh…no?"

A relieved ooze that loosely equated to me melted to the floor of the bus, and Rex made a sound of alarm as he grabbed the now-loose pages.

"Arya? What's wrong?! Is it really that bad?"

A deep, shuddering breath convulsed my form on the ground.

"The American fitness grand pacer test is the stuff of whispered and horrified legend." I raised a shaky finger. "Two lines lie across the vast expanse of the gym floor. Between the twain lies a gulf of exhaustion and tear-streaked fear! You must run to the opposite line, my child, before the dreaded beep."

"That's not so bad." Rex said reasonably, helping pull my boneless form back up into the chair.

"It keeps fucking decreasing! Round one or whatever its fine, only a little bit of time shaved off between beeps, and you can jog easily to the opposite end and wait for a bit, but then it keeps upping the pace! The interval of each beep is shorter than the last! And after only a few minutes you can't stop running, you can't slow down, its one continuous run where you pivot and dash back from whence you came! And if you have the _audacity_ to try and break out, like slow to a jog and then stop because the beep sounded before you made it to the line, the gym teacher chews you out! You didn't put in enough effort! You aren't pushing yourself! So what if your lungs are aching and you're all sweaty and you hate every single microsecond of it, push yourself harder you lazy six-year-old bum!"

I waved my hands in the air.

"Fifty laps, sixty laps, seventy laps, the legends that keep going after everyone staggers out in exhaustion, its such bullshit! It doesn't test anything! It just heightens nervous tension, social pressure, and fucking exhausts the kids! We're in elementary school man, why they got us sprinting like that!?"

I flailed angrily.

"Uh, well, we don't do that at the DWMA." Rex said, tentatively reaching out to pat my shoulder. "The physical test is just push-ups and sit-ups and a 2-mile run. They expect you to do about 13 push-ups in two minutes, and 47 sit-ups, and if you can do the two-mile run in under twenty minutes, you're in."

I felt myself relax a little. That wasn't so bad. I'd never counted how many push-ups and sit-ups I did in my morning exercises, but I could probably make the cut if I pushed myself. I hadn't run properly in ages, but I had been horseback riding, which at least meant I wasn't sitting around doing nothing with my leg muscles.

Of course, what with the schedule we'd been given, I was going to finally have a chance to get back into proper shape, since we had gym first thing every morning at 7.10 AM. I'd have to get some desert-appropriate exercise clothes, and also a water bottle.

Shuffling papers aside, I checked our schedule sheet again.

* * *

`Day A Schedule:  
7.00-7.10: Homeroom  
7.20-8.00: NOT Physical Education  
8.10-9.00: History  
9.10-10.00: Social Studies  
10.10-11.00: Science  
11.10-12.00: NOT Lunch Period  
12.10-1.00: Study Hall  
1.10-2.00: Mathematics  
2.10-3.50: Meister Studies  
`

` `Day B Schedule:  
7.00-7.10: Homeroom  
7.20-8.00: NOT Physical Education  
8.10-9.00: History  
9.10-10.00: Social Studies  
10.10-11.00: Science  
11.10-12.00: NOT Lunch Period  
12.10-1.00: Study Hall  
1.10-2.00: Mathematics  
2.10-3.50: Weapon Studies  
` `

` `` `

` `` `

`Day C Schedule:  
7.00-7.10: Homeroom  
7.20-8.00: NOT Physical Education  
8.10-9.00: History  
9.10-10.00: Social Studies  
10.10-11.00: Science  
11.10-12.00: NOT Lunch Period  
12.10-1.00: Study Hall  
1.10-2.00: Mathematics  
2.10-3.50: English  
`

* * *

``

``

It looked like our school schedule was split up into a rotation of three different "days," A through C, with a different final hour for each new day. For the Day A schedule, there'd be something called Meister Studies from 2.10 to 3.50, and if it was Day B, it was Weapon Studies. Day A was Monday and Wednesday, Day B was Tuesday and Thursday, and Friday was taken up by Day C, where presumably our whole class reunited for English.

Interesting. This seemed slightly more like a college schedule than I'd expected, especially considering that most of the other students, aside from me and Rex, were in middle school, or at least around that zit-and-angst-ridden age of 13-15.

Another shiver spiked up and down my body. Middle school was a tough time for everybody, but looking back on even my own experiences was almost as bad. The formative years of becoming and independent individual were a bitch to get through, especially when everyone around you was having the same problem and handling it in a variety of not-so-good ways.

I jumped a little as Rex tapped my arm with a sideways jerk of his hand, simultaneously pressing a button embedded in one of the nearby poles with his other hand. "This is our stop!"

We both stood and made our way to the front of the bus as it slowed to a stop, offering the driver a friendly wave before trotting down into the street. Since we were heading to Rex's family provider, someone who knew the DWMA and would have no problem collaborating on what needed collaboration with, I was putty in his hands as we headed down the street –Knife Boulevard, ha ha– towards a small family-friendly-looking squarish building with the peaked red-tile roof and white plaster walls typical of Death City. My estimation that it was a family clinic was only confirmed when we stepped inside and I saw the bright happy posters everywhere, as well as a role of large stickers on the receptionist's desk.

"Uh, hi." I said as we approached, setting down my bag. "I'm a friend, er, Rex's new partner at the DWMA, and I'm here for…"

"Full physical examination." Rex said, taking over as he saw my uncertainty. "She doesn't have any ID or medical records, so we're building them back up again from the ground."

The receptionist nodded. "I see. The doctor should be available for an exam, however, there is a fee-"

I held up the envelope with my $200 weekly allowance.

"That'll do. Rex, if you could wait while we look your partner over?"

"Um, sure." Rex said, casting a nervous glance in my direction as I forked over the requisite cash. It reminded me of a puppy checking on its brand-new owner…I was half-tempted to pat his head and tell him he was a good boy and I'd be back soon. But he took a seat in one of the cushy waiting chairs calmly enough, picking up a well-worn child's picture book and seemingly content to wait as the receptionist led me through the cool hallways to a small examination office with flattened white window shades, undoubtedly done to block out the bright Nevada desert sun. I sat down on the thin crinkly paper atop the padded examination table, dropping my back on the ground and prepared to wait.

It was a boring few minutes, largely because this office was fairly blank aside from the usual medical paraphernalia. On the right-hand wall next to the door was a rack of the various eye and ear testing instruments, along with the dispenser of sterile tips for them, with my examination table stretching out towards the far right-hand corner. There was a standard office chair for visitors on the wall opposite me, right next to the desk, with a cabinet above the desk and a set of drawers below, and a rolling chair for the doctor. There was also a very large, boxy computer and old-fashioned mouse. The left wall had the window and a box of sterile gloves bolted into the wall, and the wall behind me had a set of scales, a measuring pole for height, and a sink. Not the most investing of views, especially since I'd been seeing one just like it for a decent portion of my childhood.

With perfect timing, a lady whom I presumed to be the nurse bustled in just as I was thinking about diving into my apocalypse bag for a book, clipboard at the ready.

"So you're Rex's new partner?" she asked, and I nodded and reached out, meeting her handshake halfway. "My name is Mchumba, I'll be your nurse today. Before we get started, do you have any medical conditions we should be aware of?"

"Nope." I said, swinging my legs a little atop the table, just like I used to when I was small. "At least, not so far as I know."

She scratched something out on her clipboard. "Any allergies?"

"Also not so far as I know."

"Past surgeries?"

"Uh…" I rubbed my neck and the slash of discoloration there. "Kinda? This, um, this thing happened with a cut on my neck, and I know I had to undergo an operation to like close it back up and stuff. Not sure if that counts."

"It counts." she said, writing busily. "Do you know if there were any complications or adverse effects of the surgery?"

"Nope. Surgery went through fine and it healed clean." I said, which was especially true given the fact that a friend of mine had pulled some haxors crap and healed the wound supernaturally fast with some borrowed regeneration. It was too bad there was still a scar, but hey, it gave me badass points.

"Mm. Ooookay. Do you smoke or regularly consume alcoholic beverages?"

"Nope and nope."

"Do you exercise regularly?"

"Uh, yeah. I have a morning routine that I go through, sit-ups and push-ups and contortions and whatnot." I said, continuing to idly swing my legs. "Stuff to keep me in-shape and flexible, and now that I have the opportunity, I'll probably start running again too."

She nodded, scribbling frantically.

"Do you, or have you in the past, consumed drugs for recreational purposes?"

"Also nope."

"Are you currently on any medication?"

"Nope."

"Is there any history of mental illness within you or your family?"

"Not that I know of. I'm pretty boring, health-wise."

"Boring is good. Right." She clicked her tongue as the frantic scratching of the pen continued, before tapping it briskly against the clipboard and clicking to sheathe the nib. "This is a DWMA examination, so we're going to have to be more thorough than your average medical exam. You're a NOT student?"

"Yep."

"Then you aren't going to be expected to start fighting Kishin or anything like that for quite some time, but all the same, its still DWMA policy for all students to be assessed on the same basis as the conventional army and police forces. You have no medical records, is that right?"

I winced, and slouched a little from where I sat on the table. "Uh, yeah."

"May I ask why?"

"I ran away from home, and I don't even know where my family is right now, never mind remember who or where our doctor is or was." I explained, trying to keep in mind the fact that all this information would be transmitted back to the DWMA. "And since I skipped town before I got my driver's license, I don't really have like…any ID, since everything requires either that or your social security, or both, and I don't know mine."

Mchumba gave me a sympathetic frown.

"Well, we're going to fix that here and now." she said kindly. "Now, since you don't have any records, we're basically going to have to assume the worst and give you everything again from the ground-up. That means blood-typing along with the standard medical exam, and all the required injections."

I stiffened. "Injections?"

"The DWMA is an international school, with students who travel to just about every country in the world and interact with individuals of every age." Mchumba said with the typical blitheness of a nurse who didn't have to get the shots. "Hence, the full battery of vaccination is required for all students."

I shrunk back nervously.

"And…how many is that?"

"27."

Keen ears may have been able to detect the sound of my soul dying a writhing and painful death.

"But that's at the end of the exam!" she said happily, spinning her pen. "First we have to get height, weight, blood pressure, eyes, ears, and heart! You can lock the door while you climb into that hospital gown there, and I'll be back soon with the doctor."

_***Time Skip***_

Thirty minutes or so later, I was limping out of the doctor's office without a single lollipop to my name, though I had the dubious pleasure of the absolute and irrefutable knowledge that I was 5'10, my blood pressure was 117/77, I weighed 153 pounds, my blood type was O-positive, and I had no current health defects. The doctor had also poked around my body everywhere to make sure of the individual location, size, and tenderness of my inner organs, stuck a thingy in my ear to make sure it wasn't blocked, and then administered a hearing test. They'd tested my vision, too, and pronounced it good, and listened to my lungs and heart to make sure my breathing, rhythm, and valve function were normal. While typing my blood, they'd also drawn some for testing, which I would hear back on eventually –I wasn't worried, given that I was more than fairly certain there was nothing out-of-order with me in the physical sense.

I was also _thoroughly_ vaccinated, with five or six kiddie bandaids (some which had Lord Death skulls on them, which was disturbingly cute) patched over each of my inner elbows and a further dozen plastered all over my aching thighs, once again re-clothed in my swim shorts rather than the paper-thin gown. I also had the paperwork for the DWMA, most of which was now filled out, excepting things like legal ID, place of residence, and other such notables that were basically nonexistent for me.

"Hey." Rex said, blinking a little as he saw the colorful plague of bandaids dotting my arms and legs. One was also wrapped around the tip of my finger, since they'd needed to draw a pinprick of blood for the typing part. I felt like a pincushion.

"Is this all we need for documentation?" I asked miserably. The real bitch of the matter was the fact that I knew I'd _had_ at least a decent portion of these injections before, but without proof and without knowing which specific ones, I'd had to endure them all over again.

"Er, we can drop all this off tomorrow, but yeah, for right now that should be enough." he said, standing up and putting his latest tattered picture book aside. "I can show you the way back to the girls' dorms, and then, um…"

He looked away and rubbed the back of his neck. A subtle pink glow crept up his face.

"…maybe we could…hang out? A-as like a partner thing?"

I blinked a little, then shrugged. "Eh, sure." An idea struck me, and I began to grin a little. "Death City has libraries, right? Maybe we can check them out _before_ we go to the dorms. Eh? Eh?"

"Oh, uh, yeah sure." Rex stammered as I tugged him out onto the street. "Whatever you say!"

Whatever this guy's deal was, I was starting to figure out that it probably had something to do with his past partnership. Maybe he and his partner hadn't clicked? There really wasn't a precedent for that sort of thing as far as I knew in the series…granted, the series followed the best and brightest teams as a matter of course, but even then, Weapon-meister partnerships didn't really…end. Sure, Soul and Blackstar had split off from their respective partners Maka and Tsubaki to make their own team _once_ (for not even one full episode), with hilariously bad consequences, and in the manga, after Kid had been kidnapped, Liz and Patty had briefly used each other, but that was really, like, it. Blackstar had failed to even pick Soul up, and they both lost a schoolyard fight, and Liz and Patty were siblings, which seemed to negate the usual Weapon-wielding-Weapon rule. Oh, and that dweeb Hiro had used Excalibur for a while and then split up after the legendarily annoying Weapon had finally broken him with constant sneezing, but that was the so-called Holy Sword Excalibur, reputedly capable of matching with anyone, so it didn't really count either.

Meister-Weapon partnerships didn't _end_ in the series. All the faculty adults still worked alongside their respective partners, or were strong enough, or in an academic-enough position, that they didn't need them. In Justin Law's case, he'd never had a meister to begin with, which was understandable enough, I supposed. Physically wielding a buster sword like Rex was difficult, but physically wielding a fucking _guillotine_ in a fight was all but impossible.

So in Rex's case, he'd had a partner, but he didn't now. Why? That wasn't normal, by DWMA standards. Rex seemed like a fairly likable guy, so unless he was somehow hiding intensely diabolic tendencies, it wasn't as if he was the sort of person to have scared his meister off. He was a NOT student too, a noncombatant, which meant it was unlikely his meister had died (yikes) or been injured to the point of retirement. And Rex had specifically said he'd _had_ a partner, in the past tense, and been looking for one ever since, and he'd been in the NOT class for _years_.

I didn't have enough information for a full picture yet, obviously, but it was becoming suspiciously likely that Rex's prior partner had ditched his ass, for reason or reasons currently unknown. That'd explain why Rex was so eager to please and weirdly okay with me manhandling him –other than any specious body-irreverence that came with him occasionally being an inanimate object designed to be held, he _possibly_ didn't want to give me even the slightest reason to ditch him as well. Hence, constant affirmation, acceptance, and placation.

That was concerning, and I'd have to push Rex to have a little backbone for himself, since otherwise it'd be too tempting to constantly run right over him. Meister-Weapon partnerships occupied a weird space that wasn't just friendship but usually wasn't romance either, but there was a definite sense that meisters tended to be the ones that wore the metaphorical pants, and I wasn't entirely comfortable with the notion of a Weapon –of _anyone_ – who was just automatically okay with anything I said or did, solely because I was the socially-accepted dominant partner. I did not want Rex to get into the habit of deferring to me all the time, despite his own personal judgement and past his own opinions.

He was proving useful _now_ , though, chaperoning me around Death City and the public libraries there, flashing his DWMA student ID in place of a library card for the books I checked out, which was a bit nepotistic, but whatever. The less paperwork I had to fill out right now, the better. My elbows were still achy from all the needles that had been stabbed into me.

"So, see you tomorrow on Bus 42?" I asked as we stopped at the gate of the girls' dorm, fenced-in by an ornate iron gate. Rex bobbed his head, still looking a little uncertain. "Partner?"

"Y-yes!" Rex jumped involuntarily, his chin jerking up as his eyes met mine. "Ah, see you tomorrow!"

I saluted him around my stack of books, grinning a little, and we went our separate ways as I trotted up to the doorway, shadowed by an elegant balcony. Palm trees and other desert-suitable greenery provided a lush yard, and I was able to hook a finger around the doors and pull them open with comparatively little effort, which was good, since I was still loaded down with my apocalypse bag as well as the stack of books.

Okay…I could see what Rex meant by saying the girls' dorm was luxurious. The outside looked like a resort, the building looked like a baroque mansion of orange brick and pale columns, and the inside entrance hall had a fireplace hearth, a raised portion behind wooden railing full of chairs and coffee tables for lounging against one fall, and a green fainting couch with another table in front of it, not to mention even more plush furniture scattered about, elaborate paintings on the walls, and an ornate staircase. More hallways opened up into the other parts of the building, which was far longer than it was tall, and the glimpses I caught into the other rooms seemed equally baroque.

_Ooooookay. Sweet. What's the boys' dorm like? I feel sorry for Rex…then again, anything would seem sucky compared to this._

"Uh, hello?" I asked aloud. This was a dorm, after all, and I was pretty sure school was out, so there should be at least two or three people within hearing distance at any given moment.

"Oh? Coming!"

An adult woman in a plain olive-green button-up shirt under a dark burgundy dress stepped into the room. She had a thinnish red-bound book under her arm and dark brown hair that fell to her shoulders with a slight curl –and her eyes seemed to be permanently closed. Weird, I grant you, but this was an anime, and it wasn't exactly the first time I'd dealt with someone in that…art style?

It was one of the few meta things I was still fuzzy on.

"Uh, I'm one of the new NOT students for this semester." I said, shifting from one foot to another. "And you are?"

"My name is Misery." she said with a pleasant smile, taking me a bit aback. "I'm the superintendent of this dormitory, I live in my office on the first floor and you can come down anytime you need something. Do you have a partner yet?"

"Rex Rayner." I explained, and watched in surprise as her eyebrows twitched just a little. The motion was so subtle and so quick I couldn't even register what the expression was supposed to be, but it was definitely a change in expression.

_Just what the hell kind of drama was between him and his first partner?!_ I shrieked internally. It wasn't anything _illegal_ , was it!?

"Well, he'll be in the boys' dorm, so we'll have you with one of the unattached meisters." Misery said without a break in her cheerful demeanor, beckoning me up the stairs. I followed, noticing as I did that the landing and hallways were…weirdly skewed. I was used to architecture that took me in a straight line, but everything seemed to be weirdly tilted or angled, like a funhouse. Thank god the floor and walls were flat, at least, even if the way the hallways and roomed joined together was weird.

"Uh, out of curiosity's sake, these dorms are separated by gender, right? What happens if someone's trans or genderfluid or whatever?" I asked as we turned the corner onto the second floor, looking with interest at the narrow piano against one wall and the draped bay window in the corner of the building, with a convenient lounging seat underneath.

"It depends." Misery hummed. "If the student transitions after they've been enrolled in the school, they're usually allowed to switch to the correct dorm, and of course, if they've transitioned prior to entering, they enter their proper dormitory as a matter of course. Genderfluid students can apply to their dorm of choice."

"Neat." I said, which it was. "How many students are there?"

"The EAT students tend to live in their own rented apartments throughout the city, so the dorms are mostly NOTs and first-years." she said as she led me along a long stretch of hallway which seemed to cover the entire front of the building, bright windows on one side and a uniformly-spaced row of dorm room doors on the other. "The division between boys and girls is fairly even, so we're looking at about 580 residents in this dorm every semester, give or take. The dorm has capacity for 590, with 115 rooms on the first two floors and attic corridor of the main wing, with a further 180 in the two side wings, since they have three floors each. We try to settle the new NOT students in the main wing close to the stairs, since you're not used to the DWMA schedule yet."

"Makes sense." I hummed. After all, if school started at seven in the morning, and it took roughly an hour to get up the steps…plus bus time…

_Oh Jesus lord fuck._ I'd have to get up at like five in the morning!

_I am never, ever, again going to complain about waking up early to go to school._

"Basic necessities are provided for, like shampoo and hygienic products, but food expenses and luxury items are on you." Misery continued cheerfully. "The kitchen and bathroom are both communal, as is the laundry. I can get you a map if you like, or show you later. But for now, here's your room!"

She opened a door that was functionally identical to all the rest we had passed, showing me a tolerably cozy room with fancy green wallpaper and two half-poster beds with brass frames against the opposite wall, both at a reasonable distance from each other. There were two nightstands beside each bed with matching small lamps on them, also made of brass and with a dark rose shade, and between those two nightstands was the window, facing out into the backyard of the dorms. On either side of the door I'd come in were smallish student desks, each topped with another lamp and with a comfortable chair parked before them.

There was also a black-haired girl on one of the beds, midway through painting her nails with a sparkly midnight-blue polish.

"You can rearrange the furniture as you like during your stay," Misery said with one hand still on the door, smiling. "But please keep your fellow dorm residents and the noise in mind when you pull everything around."

"Uh, yeah, sure." I said.

"Of course, Miss Misery." my roommate agreed placidly.

There was a moment of silence after Misery left, and I turned to drop my books on the table, then my bag on the bed.

"So, um, hi." I said. "My name's Arya, I'm in the NOT class."

"Ao Hoshino." the girl chirped, continuing to paint her nails. "I look forward to learning from your example!"

Wait a second…

The tickle of memory in my brain exploded into lucid thought. I _did_ recognize this chick –she'd been the one to creep in right behind me after I'd gotten tangled up in the NOT orientation class. More than that, though, she was in _Soul Eater Not!_ –she had teamed up with Tsugumi Harudori at the very very end, like in the very last ending scene of the manga when school reconvened after spring break. The "learn from your example" thing was what tipped me off: she'd said the same thing to Anya Hepburn and Meme Tatane when they'd returned to find that Tsugumi had inadvertently sucked in a _third_ meister for their already-unconventional meister-meister-Weapon triad partnership.

Ao already had her dark blue fuku, which surprised me a little, since we weren't fully enrolled yet, with a small Lord Death-skull pin over her heart where the scarf would've gone and another mask on her left sleeve, though one of the black round eyes was replaced by a five-pointed star…which matched Ao's yellow, star-shaped pupils, surrounded by a deep violet-blue.

That just about exceeded my anime tolerance for weird.

"Uh, not to be weird or nothing, but your eyes…" One finger rose to just underneath my own eye in demonstration.

"I'm from the Hoshino Clan." Ao chirped, which told me absolutely nothing. It hadn't been mentioned in the manga at all, and I don't think she even _showed up_ in the prequel anime. "We're an offbranch from the Hoshi Clan."

"Ah…right." I said, lowering my hand. That didn't tell me anything either.

Ao smiled placidly. "You may not have heard of them I suppose, since our paternal dojo is much less infamous than the Star Clan, another offshoot."

If there'd been anything in my mouth, I would've done a spit-take. The Star Clan I knew –they were Blackstar's family, a clan of assassins infamous for doing anything for money, and the DWMA had wiped them out after they started chowing down on human souls for power as well as murdering for money. Blackstar had been the only survivor, being just a baby at the time, and the DWMA had taken him in –something less disturbing than it sounded, since Blackstar admitted he didn't resent the school and that the whole thing was "a simple case of cause and effect," that his parents crossed a line they shouldn't have and paid for it by losing their souls.

It was coming back to me again –Akane Hoshi was an EAT-class student that had been briefly assigned to NOT to guard Anya Hepburn, who was a foreign princess, which was why the name "Hoshi" had sounded familiar outside anime nerdery. His partner, Clay Sizemore, was a great sword, and they were both subordinates under Sid at the DWMA Central Intelligence Agency. Akane had the distinctive yellow-star pupil underneath his glasses and the left-hand sweep of his bangs, which was why he stood out in my memory, since he was the only other person (aside from Ao) in the entire series besides Blackstar and his father that had the signature star eyeballs.

"A-ah…right…" I mumbled again, giving her a strained smile. Ao returned it happily and continued with her business, while I took up my desk chair and, not without a brief wince for my poor pockmarked arms, opened the first book.

I was looking for anything on Witches and other magic users. If magical manuscripts and other such things were so rare and dangerous in this world, I didn't expect to find anything useful for my world-array in a public library, but it certainly wouldn't hurt to have a refresher course on the types of magic-users in this world, especially if I planned to petition Lord Death.

`Witches are more long-lived than humans, with many surpassing the century mark. It is therefore difficult to gauge their actual age from mere appearance…`

Yeah, yeah, this I knew, Arachne was like 800 years old at least.

`Some Witches have the ability to transform into animals, though this is not a universal trait. All Witches, however, have animal themes to their magic and sometimes even their appearance.`

This I also knew: Medusa had snake magic, Arachne had spider magic, Eruka Frog had frog tendencies, and so on.

`Witches are exclusively female: they can reproduce with humans, Monsters, and Sorcerers, which are their male counterparts. Female offspring are almost always born Witches, whereas male offspring are entirely human or another Sorcerer. Sorcerers are almost never as powerful as Witches, with powerful Sorcerers being extremely rare.`

Okay, this was new and good information.

`Sorcerers tend to augment their lack of power by experimentation, scientific methods, and calculus spells, which rarely require the natural high levels of magic their fellow Witches are born with. It can easily be said that while Witches are typically instinctual users of strong magic, Sorcerers are precise users of relatively weaker magic. This means that Sorcerers will rarely chant before utilizing their magic, as it is contained in tools or projects.`

Also good, and it made sense, given the only male magic-users shown in the series –Noah and Eibon, and technically Giriko, though he was in a different category. Noah and Eibon were both cerebral types who focused on learning and collecting rather than brute force, whereas Giriko's whole (supposed) job was making magic-imbued protective golems.

`Each Witch in the world has a specific magic chant which they used to invoke and channel magic power. The nature of this chant varies from Witch to Witch, but is rarely if ever varied by the Witch herself: part of the reason Witches are so dangerous is that a Witch's chant may result in nearly any spell, and there is no verbal and rarely a physical indication of what said spell will be before the Witch actually enacts it.`

Yup, that was something I'd noticed in the series, and also totally not fair. The magic I used was way more laborious.

`Part of Death Weapon-Meister Academy's duty is to hunt down Witches, with the Witch soul being the final portion for a Weapon to become a Death Scythe, able to be used by Lord Death himself. Prior to consuming a Witch soul, a Weapon-meister team must consume 99 evil souls, colloquially referred to as Kishin Eggs or Kishin, after the original Kishin which caused the school's founding.`

Pssh, this was stuff they covered in the first few minutes of the first episode. I scanned down the page, then began flipping through the book, looking for something more relevant. There was a section on the atypical magic users which looked promising, and I stopped there for a moment.

`Enchanter:  
An individual who uses magic and their specialized gloves to create and control golems. Enchanters may create golems of multiple sizes and methods, but typically specialize in defensive or protective programming. An Enchanter is not a true magic-user as such, merely a manipulator, and are generally regarded more positively because of this. Their trade is based in the Czech Republic.`

`Lord Death:  
The Grim Reaper is technically capable of magic, or at least magic knowledge, though there is no records of it ever being used.`

`Magic Lifeform:  
Exceptionally skilled Witches can create their own subordinate lifeforms, typically in the same style as their animal theme. These lifeforms are much weaker than the Witch in question, but follow orders unquestioningly and may be designed or used for combative purposes.`

`Monster:  
A creature with the ability to transform between human and another animal, and may also possibly use magic. Monsters can be malevolent or benevolent, and their souls may even appear similar to Witch or Sorcerer souls due to their inherent magic power. However, Monsters are a separate species and should be treated with caution until their morality is revealed.`

`It is theorized that Monsters, Sorcerers, and Witches possibly had a common ancestor, as Monsters share many of the Witch/Sorcerer traits, such as animal themes, magical ability, and longevity, with some Monsters living hundreds of years or even in possession of multiple souls. Monster souls do not replace Witch souls, however, nor do they replace Kishin Egg souls unless the Monster in question has already descended down the path to darkness. Other theories suggest that Monsters may have been ordinary animals exposed to unusually vast amounts of magic, though this has significantly less support.`

Well, wasn't that annoying. It seemed like the best I could hope for was being labeled a Monster, which wasn't exactly reassuring, since I had a distinct lack of transformation magic, which meant that trying to claim being a Monster would be proven wrong almost immediately, painting me to be a liar. The other two options were even worse.

Not the most reassuring of realizations. Like yeah, sure, I was _pretty sure_ Lord Death wasn't going to chop first and ask questions later, but the problem was I had no good-faith gifts, proof, or affiliations, so that by taking the risk he wouldn't, I was leaving myself wide open. And there wasn't really takebacksies on revealing oneself to a god, so if I outed myself as a magic-user, what happened next was entirely in Lord Death's court.

Like sure, getting into the EAT class and turning Rex into a Death Scythe would probably take a fuck-long time, but it was also an ironclad guarantee. I'd level him up, he'd be grateful enough, or at least owe me enough, to get the books I needed, and that was my problem solved. In the unlikely event the books weren't at the DWMA, _then_ I could present my case to Lord Death, with the mute reassurance that I was a good guy in the fact that I'd put so much time and energy into helping an entirely-loyal Rex reach his full potential.

Simple, easy, and absolutely guaranteed to work.

And also _for-fucking-ever_. None of the characters in the anime had become Death Scythes, and in the manga, it had taken Maka and Soul most of the series' runtime, including a dubiously long timeskip.

Well, alright, _yes_ it would take an ungodly long time, but I did have some slight psychological advantages over the canon characters. For one, they didn't have a time constraint to become Death Scythes, it was something they wanted _eventually_. I was going at this with an ASAP mentality –As Soon As Possible. For another, Maka and Blackstar were both 13 (god that was weird to realize), whereas Kid was in the same range. Sure, four years on them wasn't that much in the grand scheme of things, but I liked to think I was at least marginally more experienced. And lastly, I had a decent amount of meta knowledge, which would probably be wise to write down at some point, which should somehow help me out at least a little, if I wrangled it right.

So for now, I would go along with this whole Weapon-meister partnership thing, and in the meantime, plot for sneaky advancement.

I pulled over a spare notebook and began to write.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: July 15th, 2020, 9.15 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: July 15th, 2020, 9.15 PM USA Central Time


	3. Trial Week: Day 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rex is getting a lot of positive reception, which is good! That just means his eventual character arc is gonna be SUPER fun for me to write. Probably less so for all you guys to read. *rubs hands ominously* Muahahaha… 
> 
> The MN Renaissance Festival got cancelled this year for safety reasons, which may or may not make me very sad, depending on whether or not I can get pics of our old site before we move. If I can sneak in and snap some pics this year or maybe if we don't move next year, I'll only be like mildly disappointed. If this was curtains and I never get access to our old site again, this may very well haunt me for years. On the other hand, though, I finished embroidering the skirt of my costume! Here's a link if you wanna take a gander:
> 
> LINK: https://catsvrsdogscatswin.tumblr.com/post/628558900398014464/mn-renaissance-festival-costume
> 
> I also deep-cleaned my room to procrastinate, and A) I hope I will never see/inhale that much dust again in my life, it was a centimeter deep in some places and turned my white carpet grey, and B) a lot of room seems to have opened up on my shelves now that I've removed the shiny/interesting rocks and put them in shiny/interesting vases. I also found jewelry and knickknacks from middle school, and a lot of other neat stuff that I forgot I had, and there was much rejoicing.
> 
> A note on the actual fic instead of news, the advancement of _Soul Eater_ technology is staggeringly bizarre. Maka makes a quip about Blackstar hanging off of Soul's Weapon form like a phone charm, but Tsugumi talks about sending letters home or making an international call in _NOT!_ , indicating that cell phones are not available. We also literally never see anyone use one: long-distance communication is mirrors only in the field, or landline phones with cords indoors. In the manga also, Kilik comments on the newness and strangeness of a wireless intercom communicator, which is stated to be a product of demon tools and is interfered with by Madness wavelengths. But TV exists. But Soul tells Liz he'll bring records to Kid's party, indicating that that's still something people commonly use, and most of the live music in _Soul Eater_ seems to be jazz and ragtime. But Justin has headphones and some kind of Walkman. But Akane talks to Tsugumi about the " Great War," which is what WWI was called before WWII happened. 
> 
> Honestly I've given up trying to pinpoint anything to one time period and decided that, as the author, what I say goes and _Soul Eater_ history is skewed just a little bit backwards, but technology advanced faster in some cases because magic/demon tools/Eibon. The year is 1900-1910-ish with roughly 1950s technology and that's that on that.

_Arya's POV:_

I'd had better mornings, and I'd had worse mornings. On the one hand, my perforated elbows and thighs didn't ache anymore, and nothing horrific had happened during the night, like my soul somehow spontaneously erupting with magic and bringing a dozen meisters down on my head under the assumption that I was a Witch doing nefarious shenaniganry, or a Kishin Egg kicking the door down and trying to devour as many future DWMA agents as possible. It was a bright shiny new day, and I had a plan of action and in theory nothing to oppose my advancement.

On the other hand, it was five in the AM with a proposed thousand-foot climb in my near future before breakfast.

I stared blearily into the mirror of the gym-like communal bathroom, moving my toothbrush with zombielike precision and speed as girls around me chattered with varying levels of drowsiness or silently gathered themselves to face the day –and DWMA stairs.

"New girl?"

Pausing mid-cycle of my toothbrush, I slowly turned my head to the girl next to me, who was blinking at me with an ingenuous expression. Fluffy brown hair and wide brown eyes, an incongruous tiny side-ponytail tied with a pink ribbon, I recognized Meme Tatane –pronounced _mey-mey_ , unfortunately– from _Soul Eater NOT!_ , Meme being one of Tsugumi Harudori's two meisters. She was wearing a white shirt and boyshorts rather than her usual loose cream-colored sweater and sea-green skirt.

"Mm?" I grunted around my toothbrush and foam. This may or may not be a good learning opportunity: _Soul Eater NOT!_ focused on the shenanigans of Meme and her two friends as Tsugumi tried to chose between Anya and Meme for her official partner, since while dual-wielding meisters were a thing –albeit rare and skilled– a dual-wielded Weapon was absolutely unheard of. Tsugumi, Anya, and Meme were the first duo-meister-single-Weapon team ever, with no repeats as far as I knew, and I only knew of two dual-wielding meisters in the entire canon of this world, those being Death the Kid, who was a Grim Reaper, and Kilik Rung, who was eventually part of the Spartoi unit, aka the elite of the EAT class, who were the top 10% of the entire school to begin with. Kilik's partners, Fire and Thunder, were also both children, which may have something to do with how Kilik could dual-wield them, kids being more malleable and whatnot.

Come to think of it, all the dual-wielded Weapons I knew about were relatives. Fire and Thunder were near-identical twins (Fire was a boy and Thunder was a girl, but since neither of them had hit puberty yet they still looked fundamentally identical except for their outfits), and Liz and Patty were siblings. Was being a blood relative to the other Weapon a requirement for a meister to dual-wield you, or just a by-product of siblings not wanting to be separated?

Er, anyways, if Meme hadn't yet paired up with Tsugumi and Anya officially, I'd have an easier time of placing my, well, time in the _Soul Eater_ canon. That'd be hard to figure out through conversation, but shortly before the trio got together, Meme's ditzy, amnesiac personality had been erased, due to the fact it was the result of brainwashing from a Witch, Shaula Gorgon.

Therefore, if she had the memory of a goldfish, I was still pre-ending of _NOT!_.

"Have you seen my ribbon?" Meme asked, and I slowly looked up to the top of her head, where said ribbon was bravely holding a chunk of hair out to the side. I pointed to the relevant spot on my own head, and she looked in the mirror, blinked, and grinned happily.

"Thank you~!"

 _Goldfish memory it is,_ I thought complacently, looking back into my own mirror as I continued to scrub my teeth.

Getting dressed required a certain amount of careful planning, the not least of which because this was a largely public bathroom and girls were dropping and donning clothes right in the open. I was personally squeamish enough that I wanted to do so under cover, and thus I had to wait for a stall to open before getting started.

Secondly, however oasis-like Death City was, however anime logic bent the rules of time, space, and meteorology, our school was still in the middle of one of the hottest deserts on earth, and I was expected to do a certain amount of strenuous physical activity today, outside of climbing the steps. I was from Virginia, and I'd spent nearly a year in England. I had _no idea_ how to dress for a desert climate.

Thirdly, I wasn't yet sure if I was in the anime or the manga of the series, and the manga was…how to put this delicately…

Pervy.

Pervy as shit.

It was that whole _shounen_ thing of catering to adolescent boys and thus including pages and pages of fanservice: there was a pantyshot every volume and a truly unnecessary amount of tight shirts, big boobs, and low cleavage. The anime sanitized a lot of that out, thankfully, but there was still a certain amount of disturbingly convenient skirt-flipping and chest-bouncing nonetheless. If _Hetalia_ had taught me anything, it was that goofy anime logic seemed to apply to the "real" anime world as well as inadvertent dimension-hoppers into it (aka, me), and I didn't want to start, end, or include accidentally flashing someone in my school career, even if my bosom wasn't quite big enough to qualify for standard fanservice.

I definitely knew that there was at least a little bit of convergence between this reality and the series I knew in my reality, since for a bunch of girls that were supposedly in the rough range of 13 to 16, there were a lot of chicks with big boobs and scanty underwear, all of whom were far more okay with flaunting said underwear and curves than the girls in the changing rooms I had grown up in.

Grumbling to myself about anime fanservice and its unnecessity, I pulled a white T-shirt over my head and buckled the palest canvas shorts I had around my waist, before tying the arms of a dark hoodie above it. Light colors reflected sunlight and heat, minimal but still loose clothing kept less heat in, and a jacket would keep me from freezing in the possibly well-conditioned classrooms, as well as serve as emergency censorship if a milkshake or something _somehow_ splashed me across the chest.

I didn't trust the anime logic of this place at all. Nope, nu-uh, no sir.

"Awareness, Balance, Clenched Fists, and Don't Fuck Your Sister." I mumbled determinedly, clenching my own fist in remembrance as I recited the ABCs bit from the _How to Survive a Harem Anime_ episode of Public Service Anime.

_Awareness! Maintain constant awareness of what's around you. Chances are it's a poorly-balanced hot chick._

_Balance! This stops erotic entanglements from occurring when you inevitably stumble and accidentally trip._

_Clenched Fists! You can't accidentally strip or grope someone if your hand is open. Although this will result in you punching a lot of tits._

_Don't Fuck Your Sister! She's YOUR SISTER! Now, you may discover that your sister is adopted. She may actually be your stepsister or your cousin. In such special circumstances, STILL DON'T HAVE SEX WITH HER YOU DEGENERATE GARBAGE HUMAN BEING!_

Luckily for me, I didn't have a sister, and Rex was probably the closest thing to "relative" I had in the world right now, and that was with us only being partners.

Hmm. In retrospect, I wondered if there actually _was_ someone else with similar genes to mine in this world, or even an alternate self. That was an aspect of all this dimensional hopping that I hadn't considered, and thinking over it now, something I wasn't all that eager to pursue.

_Whoever she might be, I wish her well, and also to stay the hell away from me._

Clicking the latch open again, I stepped out of the stall with my pajamas over my shoulder, looking at the watch on my wrist to make sure I was still good for time. The bus wasn't due for another ten minutes, which should give me more than enough time to stash my clothes in my dorm room and get back outside to the front gate, not to mention collect any papers I needed for the day, not that I had or needed any today. _This_ was the time I needed to get up at in order to snag a quick morning snack, attend to morning hygiene, and get my things together to face the day. The last two were most important, given how crowded the communal bathroom was right now and how downright bitchy a few of the girls were being about snagging specific salon stations, towels, or personal products. I could kinda get the last one, what with them being purchased on our personal dime, after all…

Trying not to be rude and crowd anyone, I swung my foot a little too far forward without looking, nudging through the crowd. My foot landed on a bar of soap, my momentum made me slip forward, and I crashed into another chick and brought us both down to the group in an unidentifiable tangle of limbs and yelps.

 _Hooo, boy, that's a tone-setter._ I thought glumly into the nameless girl's cleavage, before she shrieked in embarassment and kicked me off.

At least the nonexistent buttons of my shirt hadn't bust open to reveal my bra, or my nonexistent skirt hadn't flipped up to reveal my underwear. Apparently, living life in a slightly pervy anime was going to continue to take a lot of planning and forethought.

_***Time Skip***_

"I have a croissant if you're hungry." Rex said from beside me as the Deathbus 42 whummed patiently up the tilting, near-vertical hill of Death City. I looked over, blinking in surprise, to see that he did indeed have a croissant, and one that was still warm, even.

"Uh, thanks." I said as I took it. His slightly antsy expression brightened considerably, and I decided to nip this problem right in the bud before it could truly get started. If the worlds I went to did indeed conform to anime logic –and they did– I needed to pay careful attention to the kind of genre the anime belonged to, and thus what kind of tropes I could expect and needed to avoid.

 _Soul Eater_ was, as previously stated, a _shounen_ anime, which meant it was geared towards teenage-ish boys. This meant awesome fights scenes, implausible acrobatics during said fight scenes, unnecessary skirt-flipping fanservice (yich), and a group of protagonists banding together and fighting for friendship and love and so on and gaining strength from said bonds. _Soul Eater_ conformed to all of these, which I knew intimately, since the most powerful form of attack DWMA students could master was _literally_ using the bond between themselves to fight someone else.

But of course, it also had the magic-anime-school tropes, which included but were not limited to: harem shenanigans, school shenanigans, rampant misunderstanding both comedic and dramatic, and at least one tournament arc.

I was more worried about the misunderstandings thing, and so it was that I somewhat recklessly plunged into the mires of drama while nomming on my croissant.

"So like," I began. "You don't have to pamper me like this, dude."

This was firm ground for me: none of the Weapons in the series had been nearly so bend-over-backwards in their efforts to please their meisters, though, granted, the beginnings of all said partnerships were not shown. In fact, Tsugumi, Meme, and Anya were the only partnership that was shown in development: everyone else was already established, with only the actual moment of partnership decision being shown, and even then, only for the main characters.

"I'm not gonna snap and like throw you off the bus or something if you don't anticipate my every need." I continued through mouthfuls of croissant. "We're partners, which means we're equals, and to be brutally frank its honestly kinda uncomfortable to have my equal partner acting like some kind of slavish pushover."

"Sorry." Rex mumbled, tugging on his stud earring again.

"Don't be sorry. Be confident. Have a spine. Tell me I'm wrong, if I'm wrong. Disagree with me." I told him. "I actively encourage it."

"I don't know…" Rex said, continuing to tug on his earring.

My eyes rolled towards the heavens. "What's your favorite color?" I asked patiently after a moment, looking away from the window.

"Eh?" He turned his head a little to blink at me. "Um, red."

"And mine's green." I said blandly. "Our disagreement is established."

"Wait, I-"

"Nope!" I held my hand over his mouth as Rex looked worried. "You can't change it. Seriously, dude, you're your own person. Have your own opinions. You're only an extension of me when we fight a bad guy, and at all other times, I fully expect you to have your own mind, thoughts, and wants, which should conflict with my own as needed, and also not change to accommodate me. You got it?"

His eyebrows furrowed, and he looked concerned over my hand. I decided to play dirty just a smidge, even though I wasn't _entirely_ lying about this next bit.

"You keep trying to bend over backwards and become my yes man like this, I might have to find a different partner."

Sudden, surprisingly intense panic flashed across his face, and Rex nodded rapidly, this time apparently not caring that he might dislodge my hand.

"Excellent." I took my hand away and finished off the last of the warm, flaky croissant with a happy nom. "So, what've we got on the agenda for today?"

"Physical and placement tests." Rex said, eyeing me out of the corner of his eye and relaxing a little when I showed no signs of dropping him as a partner. That was drama that I was probably going to have to address someday, but that could be a problem for future me. I had a school to settle into. "We run the physical test in the morning before it gets too hot, and then you take the placement test before lunch. After there's an entrance ceremony for everyone who gets in."

I blinked. "How many do?"

"Most." Rex said complacently, fishing around in his jacket for another croissant. I couldn't imagine wearing multiple layers with black on top in a desert climate of all places, but then again, Maka ran around in a blouse underneath a sweater-vest underneath an ankle-length black trenchcoat that she frequently wore buttoned across her entire torso, leaving only her red plaid skirt and a slice of the yellow sweater-vest peeking out.

Maybe the kids that were raised here were just immune to heatstroke, the lucky bastards.

"The requirements and expectations for the tests are public, so anyone who wants to join the DWMA generally knows what they are beforehand and can train if they need to." Rex went on to explain. "Generally the people that fail didn't think it through all the way, or they showed up without knowing about the tests."

I raised an eyebrow. "That happen often?"

"Sometimes kids run away from home to try and become heroes." Rex said, hunching over his croissant with a sad and sheepish look. "They're young enough that they don't know that much about the entrance exams, if they know about them at all."

I winced with him. _Ouch_. It was bad enough to risk familial wrath to run away from home, but it would be infinitely worse to have your dreams smashed by cruel reality and _then_ , presumably, packed off right back home.

Well, hopefully I'd do well enough on most portions of the test that my inevitable fudging on the history and other such aspects would be overlooked. I had the physical training part, at least, in the bag.

Since I was fairly sure my timing in the series right now was solidly in the middle of _NOT!_ , that meant I had a little wiggle room to plan and think before Asura was released from beneath the school and everything went to hell in a handbasket. Then again, thinking it over…not much had specifically gone to hell. Sure, Stein said that there was the risk of countless evils awakening, being as the Kishin's Wavelength strengthened the wicked all across the world, but the only perceptible effect in the anime had been Arachne's revival, which may have happened regardless given as she'd been putting herself back together for 800 years and had also been spying through her spiders already anyways, and in the manga, well…

Okay, the Clowns had been a thing, and there was no telling how many people, aside from Justin, that they had seduced into Madness, not to mention how many they killed in their no doubt nefarious but undocumented and unmentioned rampages across the world. And because Justin had gone darkside, Joe Buttataki had died, but beyond that…

Fuck. Had that _really_ been all the damage Asura ambiently caused by merely being resurrected?! From the way the characters panicked about it and all the threats they talked about it posing, you really got the feeling his Madness spreading across the world should've been more…problematic. Damaging. Catastrophic.

Instead you got a few new villains popping up and one filthy fucking traitor. Underwhelming.

Plans on what exactly I was gonna do about the anniversary night and the accompanying Kishin unleashment continued to keep me occupied throughout the gasping fatigue of climbing up the stairs and the pause in the changing rooms before our test, since ethically I didn't like keeping quiet, but realistically I knew I couldn't say anything. How could I? Why would Lord Death believe me? And even if he did, what then? Medusa's faction (with the notable exception of Free) would probably all be executed, which wasn't that much of a shame, but on the other hand, would that include Crona, who was mostly the victim in this? Would I be responsible for his death? Would he never get a chance at redemption?

On the flipside, people would _die_ if I didn't try to avert the Kishin's revival. Thinking of whether or not I would actually succeed in warning Lord Death was moot –certain death one way, chance of survival another. It didn't matter how much of a chance it was, there was still _a_ chance, whereas I would be condemning numerous people –which people changed depending on whether or not this was the anime or the manga– with absolute certainty if I decided to stay silent. Not saying anything was the coward's way out, and yet, like all isekai and time-traveling protagonists, I was leery of losing my meta knowledge by prompting the timeline to change.

So it was a decidedly more gloomy me that tromped out with the other prospective Weapons and meisters…well, actually just the meisters for now, since Weapons were accepted into the school regardless of skill and the test was, for them, a way to measure their athletic prowess rather than assess their skill levels.

Mira Naigus was the school staff member waiting for us at the edge of the track field at the rear of the school, instead of Sid, her partner. Said field was hemmed in by the black walls that served as the school's foundation, and was absolutely huge, encompassing not only a monstrously large track field but also several other pieces of equipment, including a field for shotputting, one of those hurdle-bar-thingies and pad for the high jump, and other such athletic equipment I didn't have the gym membership to accurately identify.

I was more focused on Naigus, who was waiting for us dressed in a pale tracksuit that stood out well against her dark skin, her dreadlocks tied back into a springy bun and prim glasses perched upon her nose. A stopwatch and a whistle were hung around her neck, and she held a clipboard and pen. She looked very professional, which really was to be expected, but I was caught up a little by the lack of mummylike wrappings covering her body.

Seeing her lack of mummy-wrapped bandages, I realized something else –Sid's death. Or rather, his _lack_ of death, which was a prime indicator of where I was in the plotline, as good or better than Meme's ditzy memory. If I was remembering things correctly, Sid's death and zombie-revival was the first story arc of the main series, right after the introductory/prologue that dealt with Maka, Blackstar, and Kid in that respective order as they went on missions that served to exemplify how things were done in the show, and how they specifically did things.

Hence, Sid wasn't dead, because his partner hadn't started (involuntary or intentionally? The series had never covered it) mimicking his undead theme. Naigus looked nice and normal, and I had seen for myself yesterday that Sid was still alive. Ergo, this was definitely at least some time before the start of the main series.

My mood lifted a little at the good news, and so I stood placidly with the rest of the NOT group as she began outlying the rules.

"There's three parts of the test that future meisters have to pass before they can become DWMA students." she said in her warm, calm voice. "We'll start off with the push-ups. We expect you to be able to complete 13 standard push-ups within the two minutes given. If you can't, I'm sorry, but you will not be able to attend the academy at this time. However, there's nothing that says you can't try again next semester. Now, will the meisters take their places?"

"Do you mind if I cheer for you?" Rex asked tentatively, and I winced so hard it became a cringe.

"Uh, is anyone else going to be cheering?"

His eyes flicked over the milling crowd of meisters and Weapons, undoubtably looking for anyone he knew. "Um…no?"

"Then let's not make this awkward." I said, patting his shoulder heavily. "It's the thought that counts, and I know you'll be thinking of my success."

More importantly, there wasn't any reason to be worried about this, I thought complacently as I went over to take my place with the other meisters on the flat green grass. Sure, maybe a year or so ago I'd be quaking in my sneakers at the idea of even one push-up, but after Germany put me through thinly-disguised hell in an attempt to train me alongside my friends, I'd continued onwards with those kinds of exercises, and I put in twice this many push-ups every morning. Sure, they weren't _timed_ , but the very fact I could complete that many lent me confidence on my success in being timed. Thirteen push-ups within two minutes wasn't _easy_ , but it was also, in theory, something any civilian could be capable of with enough practice. They gave us a nice, achievable test to make sure we were all athletic enough to at least have a _chance_ at defending ourselves/escaping, should the worst ever come.

The sit-ups and the run were in the same vein. They pushed the boundary of what ordinary school-age children could reasonably do without setting us an impossible goal. We needed to be good, not the best. That was reserved for the EAT class, and I wondered, as Naigus blew the whistle and we began, if there was a similar, more strenuous test to get into that juicy top 10%, or at least make sure you could survive once in.

Oh, well. That was a goal for after I'd gotten firmly established here and Rex and I actually had a working partnership. We were still in the awkwardly-dancing-around stage of getting to know one another, though with time and luck that should change.

As expected, since Naigus was watching us with a stopwatch, there wasn't anyone who tried to do a rapid set of micro-push-ups, and while I didn't take my time with it, I also didn't let confidence undo me. No, I kept my eyes focused on the bright, surprisingly lush green grass as I pushed myself up and down, biting my lip as I tried to measure out each push-up as exactly as I could. Since two minutes took 120 seconds, I could do three within the first twenty and then have a whole ten seconds for each new push-up, which was more than enough time if I did it smoothly and carefully and made sure to count in my head to make sure I didn't miss anything. I did _not_ want to have to endure the embarrassment of failing the physical test and getting kicked out of the school before I had truly begun.

In isakei terms that was like failing before you met your exposition character.

Then again, Rex already kinda completed that role for me…

Eh, anyways. As expected, none of the prospective meisters dropped out, and Naigus congratulated us, giving everyone a moment to unwind our muscles and drink some water if needed as she beckoned the Weapons over to do their own test. Rex, unlike several of the other Weapons, seemed to have his DWMA track uniform already, which consisted of a black shorts and a white T-shirt with light blue sleeves and a tiny black Lord Death mask on the left side, under which was written "NOT."

Made sense, I guessed. Rex had been in NOT for a while, whereas most of the others were newcomers. Probably the only reason he was still here was because he hadn't found a partner…

I made a face over my water bottle. As mentioned, Rex's glaring lack of a partner after years at the academy was drama that was going to need to be addressed, sooner or later, but I wasn't looking forward to it. Rex's pliable desperation to keep me on as his current partner, plus the concerned looks Sid gave him, plus Misery's twitch at the mention of his name, all painted a fairly damning picture. I wasn't going to _assume_ , because assumptions in this kind of scenario were a bad idea even without factoring in anime tropes, but the most _logical_ pattern of events that garnered all these reactions was Rex maybe choosing a bad, or even abusive former partner, and the teachers were worried about him choosing another, and he was still perhaps adjusting out of the attitudes trained into him by his ex-meister.

Yeah. Not a discussion I wanted to have now, when our bond was pretty much nonexistent for being so new. Later maybe, when there was more mutual trust and respect between us.

_Ugh._

Anyways, as I kept an eye on my new partner, Rex was doing well with the push-ups. For all the fact he looked like a twig underneath that suit, Rex was apparently still fit. That was good, but part of me wondered why he hadn't tried to be an independent Weapon like Justin Law, the current Death Scythe for…some part of Europe. (East or West, I couldn't remember.) In any case, Justin Law had _never_ had a partner, and in theory there was nothing stopping any other Weapon from following in his footsteps.

Then again…the DWMA obviously didn't throw our lives away recklessly, so there was a decent chance there _was_ some sort of aptitude test before you were allowed to go hunt evil as an EAT student. Rex was having no problem with these push-ups, but athleticism or not he still was a skinny twig of a person, and therefore lacking in both endurance and strength by simple physics. Both of these things were key to fighting independently, so it was possible Rex had applied to be an EAT student on his own and failed the test.

I winced again. _Ouch. Maybe **I** should start pampering **him**._

After all, Justin was the _only_ independent Weapon ever shown in the series aside from Giriko, who was not DWMA-trained. There were definitely _some_ kind of safeguards or gatekeeping around that position, maybe social pressure or skill, or possibly simple chance and design. Weapons were meant to be wielded. That was how Arachne had made them, way back in the day 800 years ago. Perhaps partially transforming parts of their body instead of a full transformation was inherently difficult, or perhaps it was simply a skill that wasn't taught, as all Weapons were expected to find a meister. Perhaps there was a social stigma around being so misanthropic as to be unable to find your own meister. Perhaps most Weapons didn't _want_ to be independent, since that meant not having a partner to Resonate with and therefore having no backup.

This was the sucky part of being a meta traveler. I didn't actually _know_ , and asking would reveal my ignorance of possibly common knowledge. I only knew the results: Justin Law and Giriko were the only two Weapons that never used a meister in the entire series canon, and even then, Giriko allowed himself to be wielded by a golem of his own creation, once.

Thankfully, the entire rest of the physical test proceeded without incident: no one lagged behind and failed, and the sun's heat never got unbearable as it rose higher and higher in the sky and its slightly distracting laughter grew ever louder, a hum in the background like evening cicadas. Except, you know, the sun was _actually making noise_ , and whenever I looked up during our run I could see it grinning and laughing in the heavens, toothy face agape.

That was going to take some getting used to.

"Congratulations." Naigus said with a pleased smile as the entire new NOT class stood before her after the marathon, panting and dripping with sweat. "You all pass."

She paused for a moment as some of the new students cheered, however weakly.

"You've got twenty minutes to head back inside and clean up. My partner, Sid, will be waiting outside the locker rooms to take you to the exam hall. I'll tell you right here and now," Her librarian's flashes flashed ominously as she pushed them up her nose with one finger. "Cheating will _not_ be tolerated. Attempting to copy off another student's paper or use prior notes during the assessment exam will result in _immediate_ expulsion. Am I clear?"

"Yes ma'am!" the class chorused, some of us gulping nervously. I wasn't too bothered, as I knew precisely dick about shit when it came to the history of this world beyond the fragments covered in the anime and manga, and was therefore guaranteed to bomb the test no matter what I did. Cheating wouldn't help me now.

Well, unless there was a section on the DWMA's history specifically…

_***Time Skip***_

Showering was a rather careful exercise, given my lack of trust in the physics of this world, but I rolled out fresh and clean with everyone else, and we all followed Sid to one of the large lecture halls that dotted the academy, a circular space with tiers of conjoined wooden desks rising towards the back, a black-and-white checkered floor, and a large two-step dais on the lecture floor, with a blackboard on the wall behind it and a teacher's desk circling the curved front of the dais. There was, of course, a gigantic Lord Death skull on the wall above the blackboard, at least twelve feet long and with the three black holes of eyes and nose tilted slightly upwards, given the curved surface of the round head. Circular windows lined the back wall behind the highest tier of desks, looking out into the bright daylight, and there was a pile of papers on the teacher's desk, alongside a cup of pencils.

"Please take your seats, with a seat between you and every other student." Sid said, waving us in, and I looked with interest at the lit candles at the end of every aisle as I moved up the red-carpeted stairs with the others, taking a guilty page out of anime tropes and sitting at the very end of an aisle. Interestingly enough, the curved bank of seats behind the desks were _also_ conjoined, forming a long bench of padded red cushions. This took a moment of mental adjustment for some people, as the entire row was one whole "seat" and thus we couldn't separate ourselves out, before we all unanimously figured that one seat meant one cushion, and settled ourselves out accordingly.

Sid went to the central dais and stepped up behind the desk, picking up the papers and shuffling them into a neater stack before he addressed us, the presumably-test in hand.

"This is the placement test for all incoming DWMA students. Its goal is to assess your current level of schooling and where you should be placed in our curriculum, which is why it's so vital that none of you cheat. I follow the rules –that's the kind of man I am– but I can tell you right now that if I catch you cheating, you'll be out on your ear. It just isn't worth it."

He narrowed his eyes at us a little.

"Failing this test does not mean expulsion. In fact, we expect many of you to be unable to solve all the problems, as this test includes questions at age levels beyond your own. Everyone in here speaks English, but if you're having a problem with the test, come to me and I'll give you something in your easiest language. The test is comprehensive, covering all the subjects your last school should've been teaching you. There will be no time limit, but be aware that your lunch period starts at 11.10, and after that is the entrance ceremony. Again, don't try and force yourself to answer questions you don't understand: we value accuracy more than amount in this test. I'll be handing out the test now, so do your best, and when you're finished, come put your paper down on my desk here."

Suiting word to deed, Sid stepped over and began handing over individual packets to the first tier, who all grabbed one and passed the rest of the stack back. I took mine, then grabbed a pencil from the rubber-banded bundle being passed around a few moments later, opening my packet with some trepidation.

`Reading`

`Writing`

`Math`

`Social Studies`

`History`

`Science`

`Art`

`Soft/Hard Skills`

Curious about the last one, I paged to the back chunk of my packet and saw the questions with some relief.

`1. Are you a meister or a Weapon?`

`2. If meister, which type (Utility, Genius, Assassination, Scythe, Knife, etc.)?`

`3. If Weapon, which type (What weapon do you transform into)?`

`4. Have you had any prior training as a meister/Weapon?`

`5. Have you had a job prior to attending the DWMA?`

`6. How would your friends and family describe you?`

`7. What is your strongest trait?`

`8. Are you multilingual? List all languages that apply.`

`9. What is your highest level of education? Specify country, i.e. "England, Year 9," "France, 3rd Grade," etc.`

`10. What is your motivation for attending the academy?`

`11. What are the greatest assets you bring to a project?`

`12. Have you been in a combat situation prior to entering or applying for the DWMA?`

`13. Do you have any mental/psychological conditions?`

`14. What would you describe as your strongest subject or subjects in school?`

Though the questions seemed to be dispersed at random, likely to ease students into things, this was still stuff I could answer. I flipped back a little, to the art section, and saw it was mostly stuff on the Elements and Principles of Art, with a number of supplementary questions about technique and art philosophy, ranging from painting to sculpture to music.

Huh. Comprehensive indeed: some schools didn't even have "art" as a subject, never mind one they bothered to measure. I began to think I might like it here at the DWMA.

The familiar scritch-scratch of graphite pencils filled the large, echoing room, and I was caught in the familiar tense and yet oddly reminiscent atmosphere of test-taking. There was something nice about being in a school again: I thought it was something to do with the fact that I was here voluntarily and I'd been absentee for so long that the very sensation of being in an actual proper modern school was novel to me. It was like being a kid again, minus the fun finger-painting and snacktime.

_…I think._

Glancing down the rows to see Rex as I steadily filled out my packet, I was less surprised than I was resigned to see that he was done when I was less than halfway through, wearing a slightly old-timey pair of headphones and idly tapping his fingers on the desk, face directed towards Sid's position at the front of the room. After all, Rex had been in the NOT class for quite a while, which meant he had probably taken this test any number of times. Actually, why was he even _still_ taking it? Surely the DWMA staff knew his education level by now, having been directly responsible for it for like the past three years.

Oh well.

As I'd expected, the technical parts of the packet were hitting me hard. Reading exams really tested how good you were at critical reading –the actual material was irrelevant– so I was fairly confident with that section, but the math and science sections were a bit harder, since I –as mentioned– was only on my second year of high school when this whole mess occurred, and it'd been a year since I studied these things in the classroom, since the college I'd infiltrated was far more focused on grooming its nobility for other, more dated things. Writing was once again a bit of a doddle, since the way you structured the information and what you knew of language was more important than the prompts they gave you, and the art section was a bit harder once I got past the technical questions and into the philosophy and some of the techniques, since I wasn't musical and didn't play any instruments.

History and social studies, of course, were brutal.

I didn't know the history of this world beyond very broad strokes: Lord Death and the other Great Old Ones existed _at some fucking point_ , had beef with the Witches, and various events happened to split them up, with the Great Old One of Knowledge, the Sorcerer Eibon, either isolating himself in the magnetic field on Lost Island or locking himself inside his most powerful magic tool, BREW (depending on whether it was the anime or the manga), and the Black Mass, the Great Old One of Power, confining itself to the Book of Eibon, and Excalibur, the Great Old One of Wrath, retired to a cave in Great Britain.

And what happened with Asura, the Great Old One of Fear, hardly needed explaining, save that he ate Vajra, his Weapon partner, and then began to eat innocent human souls, went mad with power, and was eventually skinned alive and stuffed inside a bag made of said skin underneath the DWMA.

Most of this had happened at a nebulous time around 800 years before the start of the series –it'd been a while since I consumed either the anime or the manga, so my timeline was fuzzy– and at the same time Weapons were first given shape by Eibon, Eibon being inspired by Excalibur, the first Weapon. Eibon being a mostly-decent scientist despite his particular brand of Madness, however, he stopped the project to create Weapons when he learned that they required Witch's souls, seeing it as inhumane.

Then came the Witch, Arachne Gorgon, older sister to Medusa Gorgon, who spied on Eibon (or worked with him, in the anime) and created Weapons off of Eibon's blueprints, murdering her own fellow Witches and using their souls to bind humans with inanimate objects. This branded her a heretic even by Witch standards, and so she was hunted both by them and by Lord Death, and dissolved her body into spiders that she spread throughout the globe while her organization, Arachnophobia, went to ground, and hid her soul in a golem that one of her followers, the enchanter Giriko, had made –the first golem _ever_ made, incidentally.

Then came aforementioned ripping off of Asura's skin and sealing him inside a bag made of it, and Lord Death rooted his own soul as an anchor to prevent the Kishin from ever escaping, which was why Lord Death could no longer travel outside the confines of Death City and also why Asura hadn't just ripped through his own skin or something in the ensuing centuries between then and now.

All this was very fine, of course, but the problem was that even Kid, Lord Death's _own son_ , had been surprised at the news that the original Kishin was imprisoned beneath the school, and in the series, to my memory, most people hadn't even referred to Asura by name before he was resurrected, just calling him "the Kishin," even continuing to refer to Asura like this as the series went on. In the manga, when the Great Old Ones were actually introduced, Kid again expressed initial dislike and eventual shock at learning of their mere existence, never mind the fact that they were on level with his father and had once worked together, arguing further that the mere existence of the Great Old Ones were a well-kept secret.

Hence, I was going to have a lot of explaining to do if I wrote anything about them down on the test, probably.

Also the test questions _never addressed_ any of those things, asking very specific and technical questions of when things happened, things I didn't know about, and blending the history I knew about from my world in weird and confusing ways, which sort've made sense, given the existence of magic and gods and other such things here.

For one thing, my Nazi question was answered, as there were _no_ references to anything like WW2, with only something called "the Great War," which to my memory was the dated name for WW1 –and I was talking dated as in "this is what they called it back when it was ongoing or just finished" dated. Confusing me even more, the way the questions and multiple-choice answers were phrased seemed to indicate that some of the fallout and consequences of said Great War seemed to mimic the aftermath of the second world war, in how countries were partitioned and given independence in a _slightly_ more logical and deserved fashion, and how things like the EU and NATO and other such things were formed.

Further deepening the morass of my confusion, the actual current date was never _named_ in _Soul Eater_ , and the marker of wheneverthefuck the events of 800 years ago was exactly that: a statement that such-and-such happened "800 years ago." No dates, not even a specific year. I knew Excalibur had been around since at least the 12th century, since he stated that was when his legend had begun with King Arthur, and since he and the other Great Old Ones were pretty much of an age, I could at least assume they were all that old.

 _Except_ , I knew from long rants by my teacher Britain that the Arthurian mythos had actually begun with a very scanty written record in 900 AD, which said that in _516 AD_ Arthur won the Battle of Badon and in _537_ AD Arthur and Mordred fell in the strife of Camlann, and all of Arthurian canon afterwards had been added on by medieval fanfic writers. If we were going by the gospel and assumed Excalibur was talking about his legend beginning when it was written down, which was indeed in the 1100s by Geoffrey of Monmouth and his _Historia regem Britanniae_ , that meant that Excalibur and the other Great Old Ones were at least as old as the 500s, Common Era.

But since Lord Death had rooted his soul here 800 years ago, conclusively, and Arachne had "died" and Asura had gone bonkers slightly before, that meant the current year could be anything from the 1300s to the 1900s.

I could look at the current level of technology and tell that with a glance, obviously, but that was sort of a problem when the room we were in now was largely lit by candles and sunlight, but Rex had a fucking Walkman in right now. I remembered TV sets being a thing, but I also remembered Stein typing on an absolute boxy dinosaur of a computer and seemingly okay and normal with it. The range of technology seemed wildly disparate, and glancing around the room probably made it look like I was trying to cheat, so I stopped quickly.

In any case, not even knowing the current year meant that I was probably failing the history section miserably.

So it was with some amount of miserable trepidation that I finished and scooted along the row to hand in my paper, catching Rex's eye as I walked down to hand it in. Sid didn't seem displeased to see me, which was good, and hopefully indicative that I wasn't going to get the teacher equivalent of a shovel talk as Rex shuffled out of his own seat and started down to join us.

"Since you're both finished and Rex already knows the way to the cafeteria, you can head to lunch." Sid said in that quiet teacher undertone that was designed not to disturb the rest of the test-taking class. "Good job on your tests, the both of you. Once you've finished with lunch, wait in the cafeteria for us to come collect you."

"Okay."

"Yes, sir."

We both made our way quietly out of the room, and relaxed a little immediately once the door shut behind us, no longer having to pander to other people's concentration.

"So, whatcha listening to?" I asked, seeing Rex's headphones around his neck with the wire trailing down into the pocket of his suit jacket.

"Oh, um, _Rigoletto_." he said, still smiling a little nervously.

I blinked.

"It's an opera."

"Ohhhh…" I hummed, nodding wisely. "Okay then. You like opera?"

"Some." Rex said, rubbing his thumb over the rounded earpiece of his headphones. "They're good for ambient noise, like if you're doing something but want music but don't want to pay attention to the words. I, uh, don't speak Italian or German or French, so I mostly rely on memory to understand the lyrics."

"Which one's _Rigoletto_?" I asked curiously as we turned a corner, keeping a sharp lookout on how all these corridors fit together. The DWMA was infamously confusing in its layout, and I didn't want to have to rely on a guide for too long.

"Italian. It's the story of a hunchbacked court jester named Rigoletto, who works for a womanizing Duke and has a beautiful daughter that he keeps hidden away. When Rigoletto mocks a Count, Monterone, for being unable to avenge his own daughter's honor when she's seduced by the Duke, Monterone curse both Rigoletto and the Duke, which eventually ends up with the Duke seducing Rigoletto's daughter Gilda, and Gilda being killed by an assassin Rigoletto hires to kill the Duke."

"Sounds messy." I said with a wince.

"Operas usually are." Rex said with a wise, experienced nod. " _Rigoletto_ 's pretty typical, though the Duke's aria, _La donna è mobile_ , is pretty famous for being a good showcase for tenors."

" _Woman is fickle_?" I repeated with a cocked eyebrow. "Ain't _this_ guy the rampant womanizer?"

"You speak Italian?" Rex said as he blinked at me, his stride hitching a little.

"I mostly _swear_ Italian, but the guy that taught me did include some actual language lessons, sometimes." I said with a reminiscent grin. "The name doesn't sound familiar though. Hum me the melody or something?"

Rex hummed, and sure enough, it _did_ sound hauntingly familiar. How about that. It was one of those songs you knew but couldn't put a name to, something that got stuck as background music in a dozen different movies you couldn't properly remember, even when the tune still carried over.

Thoughts of music and navigating labyrinthine hallways came to a screeching halt as we turned a corner into the wide, echoing expanse of the cafeteria, filled with yet more NOT students –recognizable by their number and lack of age– chattering and chewing and filling the large hall with noise. It was ringed by over a dozen restaurant-like bars set in alcoves, with a shining silver shelf along the wall extending across the entire chain of food service stations, serving as a place to drag and slide your tray.

The Lord Death skull was emblazoned over the bulk of the wall above each station, of course, but I was amply distracted by the steam rising from various metal sinks and dishes laid underneath heating hoods, and the tempting promise of a certain cooler near the far end where all the cakes and confections were.

"-ya? Arya?"

"Huh? What?" I blinked, shaking my head a little and looking at Rex. He waved a finger by his chin, looking at me blankly.

"Um, you're drooling."

_Holy shit, really?!_

I quickly wiped my arm across my face, discovering to my horror that he was right, and a stream of anime drool had been leaking from my open mouth. My eyes had probably been twinkling, too, as I stared at the food.

"Uh, sorry." I said, flushing. "Haven't seen cooked foods like this in…a while."

Rex stared at me in silence for a moment, his grey eyes warming with sympathy. I could tell he was thinking of me poor, huddled, and alone, starving next to a suitably tiny fire with my hands and tattered shoes extended towards it, perhaps a lone cup of microwave soup with no spoon at my side. A homeless teenager fending for herself in the big cruel world, with no family to share loving company and cooked food with.

My reality was quite different: I just hadn't had access to modern technology for the past seven months, and no modern technology meant very plain, non-artificially-enhanced food by modern standards, no matter how hearty, large, or healthy my meals might've been. I'd been in transports of joy over iced tea yesterday: the promise of the wonderland of American junk food and fast food nearly had me drooling again anyways, despite how embarrassing it might be.

"So do we pay at like the beginning of the line or the end?" I asked hastily, trying to divert from my embarrassing slip into anime physics. "Or is it free?"

"We pay at the end." Rex said with confidence. "Its pretty cheap though, since we're supposed to have a little money left over every week if we budget correctly."

"Cool!" I said happily, grabbing a tray with him and starting down the line. As expected from an international school –and what I vaguely remembered from _NOT!_ – the DWMA cafeteria had a wide variety of multicultural dishes available, so that its international students could have a taste of home no matter where their home had been. I couldn't even _recognize_ some of what the workers were serving, Euro-centric traveler that I had been in my past year and homebody American for the rest of my life.

Even so, it was a struggle not to heap my tray with more food than I could actually eat at one sitting, remembering all the deliciousness I had been denied these past few months, and I eventually settled on some self-indulgent pizza slice, breadsticks, fries, and a fizzing soda, which while less greasy than what I remembered, was still heart-stoppingly clogging –in a literal sense– compared to what I'd been eating for months. I regarded my tray with glee as Rex and I sat down near one of the far walls after forking over a measly three dollars, trying hard to resist the urge to drool.

"N-not to tell you how to eat or anything, but is that what you're going to take every day?" Rex asked nervously, being occupied with such disgustingly healthy things as salad and steak. "I mean, we are trying to be a combative pair in the EAT class eventually, and those carbs aren't exactly…"

"Don't worry." I panted, definitely drooling again as my eyes shone like delighted fog-lamps down at the innocent food. "This is a one-time thing."

Rex made a reassured noise, but didn't attempt to engage in further conversation, which was good, as I fell upon my meal with all the finesse of a starving wolf. I suspected as I tore into it that whoever cooked in the DWMA kitchens had skimped on the grease and fat frying for this meal, which made sense, since like Rex said, this was a combative school, and it was better to remove or cut the temptation altogether from the impressionable minds of the young students. And that was fine, because after seven months without such things, my taste buds would probably be overwhelmed into sheer revolt if I put the real, properly greasy American fast food on my plate.

And I was paying attention to my food intake, less in a worrying-about-weight way and more in a what-will-this-do-to-my-muscle-mass-and-endurance way. Survival of the fittest began with the intake of proper fuel, after all, to build torn muscles up stronger and give energy for potential life-threatening situations.

And a life-threatening situation _was_ going to happen. Eventually. I'd given up denying my bad luck/trouble magnetism ages ago, and instead decide to prepare for it as proactively as possible. Hence, this glorious grease-fest being indeed a one-time thing, or at least a rare treat. There were other, healthier foods I could use to give my poor neglected taste buds nirvana.

Once the rabid scarfing down of food had slowed to a more normal, savoring pace, I became aware of something untoward. My gaze occasionally lifting as I ate and drank, I could see heads turning in sly little shifts nearby, catch furtive-sounding whispers amongst the larger din of the crowd. People were talking about us.

I raised one eyebrow as I sucked on the soda straw, pausing a moment to shiver at the familiar glorious taste. In a cafeteria that had seen the hijinks of people like Blackstar, who ate like a school of ravenous Hollywood piranha fish, probably complete with errant liquids, me eagerly digging into my meal like this shouldn't be _that_ weird.

My eyes flicked sideways, just a little, to see my partner. His back was to the room, and a trace thought rose to the forefront of my mind. Rex had been the one to take the lead over to our table, and it was against the wall. Out of the way. And unlike the justifiably jumpy me, he had parked himself with his back to the entire larger room, which seemed a hair odd in someone who was so _very_ concerned with becoming one of the top tier students of this military-esque school. Situational awareness was important, I knew that much without even formal training. Being able to view the room you were in was part of that.

 _More drama_ , I thought, resigned. No use asking Rex –he'd probably deny it. And when I strained my ears, the people whispering and glancing back at us were too far away in this loud room to catch any specific words, only the tone, hushed and conspiratorial. The looks were unreadable, or at least in the sense of offering anything useful. There was the universal expression of someone who had just seen something that was surprising and going to offer juicy gossip, which was _probably_ due to the fact Rex had a partner, as these were the current group of NOT students, not the incoming ones, and they'd been classmates of his for a while. There was an expression of delight as they passed that juicy gossip along. The _reactions_ to said gossip were a bit more telling: startled looks, and to my concern, occasional smug or jeering looks. A few people were wincing and looking in our direction, then quickly looking away when they saw me looking back.

This lowkey mystery of Rex's past was starting to vex me.

"So, what happened to your last partner?" I asked after tugging my mouth away from the straw, which was an innocent enough starter.

Rex looked up from his food. "Oh, um…" His hand rose and began tugging on his stud earring again, which I was already starting to recognize as a not-so-good sign of fidgety awkwardness. "I-I wanted to try out for EAT."

"And?" I probed gently, not sensing any immediate danger in his voice or posture.

"He didn't." Rex said, then took a deep breath and shrugged his shoulders as a clear ender. "So we broke up."

I managed to keep my eyebrows from rising incredulously as I nodded and made a sympathetic sound. It was a plausible enough explanation, sure, save for the fact that Rex was very _abrupt_ about it. Generally, when people told the whole truth, they didn't bite it off in as few words as possible, or include so little context and subsequent fallout about their decision.

So there was something about the whole partner situation that he was still not telling me. Which was fine –if there was some kind of deep-seated trauma there, I could hardly expect him to spill his heart out to someone who was nearly a complete stranger. Sooner or later I'd have the truth out of him.

_***Time Skip***_

Thankfully, I passed the placement test –though perhaps "passed" wasn't exactly the proper term, more like "did not do so abysmally that they kicked me out"– and thus was safe for another few days, taking my place with Rex at the entrance ceremony for new students. He was still a little tense during it, maybe fearing more questions about his sketchy partner history, and I resolved to soothe him by acting as incurious as I knew how, smiling every time he anxiously looked back and not acting like I wanted to start up another conversation.

The ceremony, to someone who knew a fair amount of meta information, was fairly nondescript. There were some new bits of fairly important information, like the fact our curriculum as NOT students could be adjusted after a while: we started with the basics to learn to control any power we might have as a matter of course, but the Weapons and meisters who wanted to angle for EAT were given a slightly different, more combative education than those who were merely here to harness their abilities to the point of being able to live normal lives. It was almost like there were two types of NOT students, the regular kids who happened to have powers and thus were required to come here as a matter of course, and the kids who came here with a fire in their eyes, determined to hunt evil.

As a matter of fact, the first group was not one I had experience with, even after my meta knowledge, and I asked Rex about it as we tromped down the stairs for the day.

"Learning how to transform into a weapon isn't instinctual." Rex said, sounding authoritative for once, hands clasped behind his head. To my annoyance, he was also several steps ahead of me, though I supposed that came with practice. It didn't matter if I was more athletic than he was: he'd been climbing these steps up and down for years, I had not. "If you don't learn to control your Weapon powers, you can hurt anyone, even yourself."

He took one hand away from his head, holding his arm out as its length shimmered and turned into the huge, chunky, cleaver-like blade of his sword form down to the elbow.

"Neat." I said by way of commentary.

"Sure, but what if I did it wrong?" Rex said, his arm whisking back to normal as he put his hand behind his head again. "I could've broken my arm, or if I was panicked I could transform parts of my body without realizing it and accidentally hurt someone. The Weapon gene can skip generations, so some people don't know until they get caught in an airport detector or something. If I panicked and lashed out, maybe hurting someone, that might be the first and only indication of Weapon powers I would've ever had."

I winced.

"The DWMA teaches us control, so that that will never happen." Rex continued firmly, obviously reciting a lesson he had learned by heart. "Once we learn the laws and fundamentals of being a Weapon here at the academy, we can live safe, normal lives, and society will accept and welcome us instead of fearing and discriminating against us."

"That happens?" I asked in surprise. It had never been covered in the anime _or_ the manga, except maybe once, in passing mention, in a single white text box.

Rex turned his head slightly to give me a look. "You havent met many Weapons, have you?"

"Nope." I said, holding on to the fact that this was absolutely true, if only because Weapons as they applied here hadn't existed for me until yesterday.

He blinked, then shrugged and turned around again. "Well, it happens. That's why a decent chunk of the NOT class are just here to learn to control themselves and then leave. Uh, NOT does get some wealthy influentials, too, on account of how much political clout a DWMA graduate gets all across the world. It's even a mandate for some countries, like Japan: the Prime Minister has to be a DWMA graduate, so there's a lot of more normal people from Japan at the academy, people that wouldn't ever try for EAT."

I made a face. _Social climbers and politician kids. **Great**._

"So…" Rex said, getting fidgety again as we neared the bottom mile of the steps. "Do you wanna do something, um, now that school's out for the day?"

I hummed in thought, considering it. Since I'd already canvassed the libraries through an unknowing Rex, my nefarious plans for advancement towards EAT didn't really need working on right now. I was also sure of my general time in the actual series canon –either a little before or at the beginning of the main series– and even though I'd like a more concrete timer, there was no way I could obtain certain information, since the only certain information pre-Sid's death involved either a whole heck of a lot of drama, or personal missions from the EAT kids. Not exactly something I could look into right now.

Sweat dripped down my face. Despite my precautions, Death City was living up to its name in terms of heat, and I decided then and there that since my meta plans were not applicable to advance right now, I may as well spend the time ingratiating myself with my partner.

"Is there a place we ice cream we can hang out at?" I asked, and Rex brightened.

"Sure! Great! I know a place!" he said excitedly, and had the audacity to drops his arms and actually pick up the pace down the stairs as I groaned and stumbled after him, my legs aching.

I ended up deadpanning at the name of the store, which was 42 Icecream, but it was a charming little store in an elegantly Italian adobe building at the corner of two streets, one tucked inside a quaint arch. Rex and I both got our ice creams, though Rex did give me a slightly nervous look, probably because I had already forked over for my medical record exam (my bandaid-ed arms twinged at the reminder) and paid for lunch.

"Chill," I said as we strolled down the ally towards a shaded bench, licking at my scoop. "I've still got over half my weekly allowance left, and there's nothing else to spend it on, right? No more paperwork I mean, I'm not going to mooch off of you for food."

"Oh, um, no." Rex said, getting a dab of vanilla on his nose on his first lick. He blinked, going cross-eyed as he looked at it, before he licked it off. "The rest of the paperwork is stuff we can draw from other information, since you have medical records the school can access now. Its mostly signing the agreement and stuff like that. Also the psychological exam."

"Psyche exam?" I asked, feeling a twinge of nervousness.

Rex hummed. "We need to make sure people entering the school are of sound mind as well as sound body." he said, nodding wisely. "Those two things make a sound soul, after all."

I was viscerally and violently thrown back to the opening lines of every episode of the anime, which used that very phase: _a sound soul dwells in a sound mind and a sound body_.

"What if someone does have mental issues?" I asked with concern. The DWMA was knocking it out of the park so far as acceptance went: no apparent issues with those on the LGBTQ spectrum, obviously no problem at all for diversity and racial equality, but what about mental health? The Kishin Asura's "madness" was considered the main threat of the series, after all…it wouldn't be odd for people to discriminate on the basis of mental health.

"Depends." Rex said with another lick of his ice cream. "On how bad the issues are. If it's really bad, like something criminal, they might be refused, but I've never heard of that happening, not even once. Usually they just get counseling or medication, or an adjusted schedule. Or some mixture of all three. Apparently, some of the best meisters that ever graduated from the school had some pretty serious mental issues."

I liked to imagine that Doctor Stein sneezed at that very moment, wherever he was in the city right now. "Has issues" did not even begin to describe him, even accounting for anime eccentricity. He had surgically implanted _a freaking screw in his skull_. And not a little one either: a bolt as thick as an ear of corn that literally went all the way through his skull, with a huge flat head that he could grab and twist, and _did_ grab and twist with alarming regularity, which is to say, at all. If there was something transfixing _my_ brain, I wasn't going to touch it, ever.

"What about Witches?" I asked, sliding closer to dangerous territory now as we sat down. "They ever seriously apply to the DWMA? Or other creatures with magic?"

Rex barked out a depressingly incredulous laugh.

"Why would a Witch seriously apply to the DWMA?" he asked. "You mean like, applying like they wanted to be a student?"

"Yeah…?" I said slowly, wondering if I was going to have to backtrack soon.

"Yeah, no." Rex huffed. "That wouldn't happen."

"You sure they wouldn't come to the school innocently?"

"Witches and Sorcerers are evil." Rex said with slightly disturbing blind conviction. "They wield magic, and it corrupts them."

"Mm." I commented, giving a guilty lick to my cone, before tentatively prodding him again. "How so?"

"The magic power they have –in the cases of Witches at least– is a vast reserve of almost unlimited energy. In the end, though, the consequences of having large amounts of any energy always ends in the same thing: destruction." Rex said confidently. "Destruction is the pull of magic, and Witches and Sorcerers are dominated by that instinct."

"What about Monsters and Enchanters and other creatures that use magic?" I asked.

"Depends on the Monster, I guess." Rex hummed, swinging his legs idly. "How much magic they have and how it interacts with their soul. And Enchanters don't have magic themselves, they use tools to pull it from the surrounding environment and shape it into the things they make, so they aren't really affected by the pull of magic. Anyone or anything else that absorbs magic or uses it is just playing with forces they don't understand, and usually can't control."

 _Shit and fuck_. There went my plans to tell Lord Death anything: I didn't fit on the scale of magical creature/magic-users in this world, and thus I'd be treated as either a freakish maverick or a liar. The best I could hope for at this point was the fact the magic in my soul wasn't strong enough for a meister to notice.

_Note to self, stay away from Stein and Maka._

The problem was, I remembered Ox and Kim having a conversation in the manga about Witches and their abilities that amounted to something nearly identical to what Rex had just said, and Eruka Frog mentioning all Witches wanted to do was run wild using magic without Lord Death controlling them, and that she loved destroying things and was glad she was born a Witch. So alas, I had to take this conversation as gospel, which boded ill for my plans. Er, mostly gospel: Kim Diehl was a Witch in the manga, and she was good.

 _Then again_ , her magic was centered on regeneration, which meant she _didn't_ live under the pull of magic…

Meh, I could argue this point later. The point _now_ was the fact that Witches and other beings with inherent magical power were not regarded favorably unless they could prove their intentions were good, and since I couldn't prove anything right now, I would have to wait to reveal myself to Lord Death.

"How long does it take to make a Death Scythe?" I asked, giving another forlorn lick to my cone. "Like the quickest record?"

"Multiple months, I think." Rex said uncertainly.

I groaned into my ice cream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: September 14th, 2020, 10.53 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: September 14th, 2020, 10.07 PM USA Central Time


	4. Trial Week: Day 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I added the therapist scene I was all like eh, I should probably just remind people that Arya has experienced legitimately traumatizing events, and then when I actually got into writing it I was like…wait…shit…why _doesn't_ she have PSTD?! Like she has experienced some truly awful stuff and the fact she's still basically completely even-keeled anyways is a little bit unrealistic on my part. Oh well. I can fix that!
> 
> Also, the entirety of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, plus The Hobbit, is 550,147 words, so I can at this point say with great confidence: SUCK IT, TOLKIEN! 
> 
> (In other words, I've written more than that for this series, discounting the AN portions of course.) 
> 
> We won't say anything about the quality of my work compared to Tolkien's, of course, especially since a decent amount of my material –this being fanfic– is leapfrogging off of someone else's ideas. I think to think I'm at least half as good as he is when it comes to creating characters, at least. 
> 
> Next is that Potter bitch, with 1,084,170 words.

_Arya's POV:_

We spent most of the afternoon cooling the desert heat with ice cream and talking about more commonplace things, like families and siblings and favorite items, and I was once again left to sprawl worriedly in my shared room as night fell.

See, I'd been mostly winging things so far, solving immediate problems like "how do I get food/shelter" and "what world am I in" rather than complex and lasting problems like "how did I get into this mess" and "philosophical consequences of an existing god in an alternate dimension?"

That was going to have to change.

Given my conversation with Rex about the corrupting powers of magic in this world, I was going to have to tread very, very carefully. See, I had already long-since established that being in an anime world meant you conformed to certain laws of anime physics, even when you weren't actually from that world. In _Hetalia_ , wearing a ninja costume had made me preternaturally stealthy: in _Black Butler_ , I had used my knowledge of the world's moral leaning (and implicit metatextual lesson) to avoid dangerous political entanglements. Presumably, in _Soul Eater_ , although I had grasped and possibly awakened my magic powers in one world and honed them in another, my magic would, possibly, begin to conform to the laws of this world as well.

So. You know. That was worrying. (Possibly terrifying, if things played out badly enough.)

The thing was, the way I had and understood my magic was closely tied with the way my teacher had taught me, which was, of course, also closely tied to his world and how it operated. Was my magic something like a foreign entity to the laws of physics in this world, or was it something that would, like an ordinary Witch, draw me inexorably towards destructive tendencies?

Either option seemed unhealthy. My magic clearly _worked_ on some level here, due to the fact I had been able to get to this world in the first place, but if it was fundamentally outside the way _Soul Eater_ as a universe operated, there was a chance that me trying to actually use magic here would blow me up or something. Or the universe would try and kick me out like the foreign irritant I was, possibly into some hellhole dimension, possibly fucking up all my efforts thus far, possibly just killing me outright. Or in the case that nothing horrific happened but my magic began to conform to the laws of this world, as I had (presumably) conformed immediately on a physical level, I would, possibly, begin living under the pull of magic and slowly descend into a destruction-crazed rampage.

Fun options. Fun, fun options.

An important corollary to this issue was the fact that I didn't actually _know_ how all this would play out. Shockingly, an ordinary education in backwoods nowhere that topped out at my sophomore high school year didn't exactly lend itself well to the complex interdimensional bullshit that got tied up in all this world-shifting, even if I _had_ taken a philosophy elective.

"Ngh." I groaned, rolling over to bury my face in the pillow. In that pose, I felt absurdly like the lead in a stupid teenage romcom, but then again, I _was_ stuck in a magic _shounen_ school. Perhaps I should feel lucky that I hadn't gotten tangled up in any ongoing harem shenanigans or…whatever ongoing shenanigans happened at _shounen_ schools when they weren't occupied with a tournament arc. (Eh, sue me. _Shounen_ anime with important romantical entanglements weren't really my thing. It was much better when they just walloped things.)

Long story short, I needed to get my shit together. I couldn't keep coasting by on the assumption everything would be fine even if I didn't pay attention to it, just because that had somehow worked out before. Honestly, that had probably been more dumb luck than anything else.

Well, no longer. First thing tomorrow, after our daily dose of schooling was over with, I was gonna return my witchery books with Rex and stock up on astrophysics.

__

_***Time Skip***_

The psyche test was honestly a lot less…intrusive, than I had expected it to be. I'd been vaguely worried about probing psychoanalysis and pointed questions that struck at the very heart of my notions of who I was and whatnot, and it was almost entirely kinda-dumb-stuff that should've gone without saying but didn't because medically, we needed to double-check all our boxes. These boxes were, in fact, yes/no/maybe/somtimes scales for symptoms of what I presumed to be various psychological disorders and a limitus of Normal Average Psychology symptoms.

No, I was not feeling any symptoms of depression. No, I was not feeling anxious. No, I was not feeling suicidal, had weird gaps in my memory where things got done around the house, felt overly reliant on the approval of others, had mood swings, or had intrusive thoughts of violent deeds.

I did pause a little at what I assumed to be the criterion for PTSD, since I had to check yes on: _Exposure to one or more events that involved or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violation, Strong physical reactions upon exposure to a reminder of said traumatic event(s), such as increased heart rate, Strong and persistent distress upon internal or external cues connected to traumatic event(s), Avoidance of thoughts, feelings, sensations, people, places, conversations, activities, objects, or situations that bring up memories of the traumatic event, Feeling detached from others, Feeling constantly "on guard" (hypervigilant), as though danger is lurking around every corner._

Hmm. Concerning. Did I have some kind of mild PTSD? I mean, I'd always understood it as a lot more traumatic for someone than what was honestly just justified paranoia on my part.

Eh, that was a worry for future me. The DWMA would step in if they felt I had concerning issues that needed therapy and/or medication –for once, it was nice to know someone would be looking out for me.

Anyways, after the paperwork Rex and I had gone to lunch together, with me again unable to catch the exact words of the whispers that _still_ rippled around us, from the same people –concerning, that– a whole day after the Rex-has-a-partner-now event had occurred. It wasn't news anymore, so why were they whispering?

I pegged that down on my growing future to-do list. _Investigate interdimensional physics, find out what the fuck is going on with Rex's partnership status, locate my exact location in the Soul Eater timeline, and possibly get therapy._ It'd be a busy week.

The afternoon part of our erstwhile orientation class took place in a largely empty classroom, with students being called out one by one for a personal 15-minute session with the school counselor and therapist. The rest of us read or drew or talked with our near neighbors: I spent the time subtly bonding with Rex by encouraging him to tell me about the more exact plot of _Rigoletto_ , the opera he'd been listening to yesterday. It was interesting, and very, well, operatic, and I strolled out to meet the therapist in a state of surprisingly pleasant anticipation, wanting to get back so Rex could tell me more about Gilda's doomed love and the fascinating, tragic hypocrisy of her father Rigoletto.

There had been a passing mention of weekly therapist appointments for Kid in the manga, but never, to my knowledge, had anyone said anything about the actual therapist, so I regarded said therapist with interest as I took my seat in the comfy office. In a multicultural school, the whole Freudian sofa and desk probably wouldn't cut it with some students, so this enterprising gentleman had decked out his office in neutral, calming soft browns, with strangely lopsided furniture that reminded me of most of the background scenery in the _Soul Eater_ anime. It looked like cartoonish cabinets and nightstands had been half-melted like wax, then solidified and smoothed over in that slumped shape: every line of furniture was wavy, asymmetrical, curved and gentle. The effect, combined with the striped faun walls and black-and-white tiled floor, was oddly childish, which I supposed made sense. Students could come to this school at a very young age indeed, and some, like the twins Fire and Thunder, were actively on the front lines before they even hit puberty. A slightly childish room was likely to inspire confidence and comfort in equal turn, and as for older students like me, well…the effect was just charmingly quaint.

The therapist himself was a tall man, probably over six feet in his socks, and muscular with it, though the tousled cut of his brown hair and the mildness in his eyes gave lie to the implicit threat of his bulky form. An odd mixture of comfort and strength, this guy, and well-balanced to deal with what were essentially militarized schoolchildren because of it. The young ones could latch onto the comfort radiating from his pleasant expression, the older kids could take reassurance in his athletic physique and the strength of his brief handshake before we both sat down on the rounded chairs.

Also, on the off chance that someone evil tried to infiltrate the academy and gave themselves away during their personal psyche screening, this guy could probably defend himself quite well.

"So, Miss Thompson," he began, taking up a clipboard and pen. "You don't mind if I take notes, do you?"

"Nope." I said, relaxing back into the wooden chair as much as I could. I didn't know how psychologists worked outside of Hollywood, and I wasn't keen to give this guy any sudden and inconvenient insights by my posture or tone.

"Alright." His voice was low and calming –encouraging, even. "I've read over your test, and if its alright with you, I'd like to talk about some of your answers."

My heart pounded a double-beat against my ribs: I tried to keep my posture relaxed, at ease, but not too much so, because then he would see that I was trying and he obviously knew about my (justified!) paranoia.

"Yeah. I mean, yeah, sure, that's what you're here for." I said, fumbling over my words a little. He nodded and scratched something down on his clipboard.

"You said you experienced a very traumatic event. Do you feel comfortable discussing it with me?"

Aw, shoot, which one?! In _Black Butler_ alone I'd had like sixteen separate brushes with death: the zombies-in-everything-but-name on board the sinking ocean liner, the zombies at the boarding school, the fight with a Grim Reaper, the mustard gas attack in the German forest, the flying through the woods while the German army attacked me and my friends, the enforcer in the alley, the necromancer, the black ghost dog…

I shivered. "Uh, yeah."

"If you're comfortable with it, can you tell me what led up to this event?"

My mind flailed in all directions, and instinctively, I grabbed at what was nearest. "I was imprisoned by an evil m- _Sorcerer_ for a few weeks."

The scratching pen jerked to a stop. After a moment, it resumed, before he gravely came to a halt and looked up at me again.

"That sounds horrible. Can you describe more?"

"Uh, yeah, sure." I shifted anxiously in my seat, raising my hand before realizing that I was copying Rex's antsy fiddle-with-earrings move when my ears weren't even pierced and lowering it into my lap again. "My…my mentor and I, the guy that was taking care of me after I ran away from home, we lived kinda isolated, and this Sorcerer…um, took him over. Like possessed his body. No one else knew about it, so I was at his mercy for a few weeks."

"And when was this?" The therapist's voice was as soft and gentle as down, like he was afraid of startling me.

"Um, 'b-bout a year ago." I said, thinking it over. "Yeah, just about a year."

"What happened to the Sorcerer?"

I had to smirk a little at that one. "My mentor managed to regain control of his body and, uh, k-killed the Sorcerer." Oh, how I wished that was the case, but Oliver was stubbornly immortal as long as Britain was alive, so we'd had to make do. "But he's like a Sorcerer, you know? He could still come back and stuff, and I wouldn't know until his hands were around my neck. So I've always been…like ever since then, I've been kinda paranoid about getting caught flat-footed."

Scribble, scribble went the pen. "What do you mean, getting caught flat-footed?"

"Well," I leaned back in my chair, crossing one leg over the other. "I guess, I mean like I'm always just a little antsy about being out somewhere alone? Heck, being alone-alone at all, period. At least if there's other people there, like even if they can't do shit, at least there'll be someone who can witness what happened to me and like…ah, spread the word."

Scribble, scribble.

"And like," I continued, rocking back and forth a little on the creaky chair. "Its not really a bad thing, but I'm way more concerned about what I eat and how I exercise, you know? Like I've always gotta be in tip-top fighting form, or else he's gonna get me. I mean, he's _not_ , and I-I'd definitely be fucked if it came to a straight-up fight between the two of us, but at least if I'm fit I've got a chance, you know?"

"So your source of ongoing fear and worry is centered on the fact that you believe this Sorcerer may come back to harm you, is that correct?" the therapist asked.

The problem with me was, there was no "may" about it. Oliver wasn't _dead_ , first off, he had been booted to a nebulous far-flung dimension and there was _every_ chance in the world that he could somehow tangle time and space with his magic and find a way back. He would definitely _try_ : Oliver was a lot of things –cannibal, psychopath, magician– but what scared me the most about him was his vindictiveness and his utterly driven mentality. He didn't forgive and forget even the smallest of grudges, he resented and remembered, and more than that, he took an eye and a nose and everything attached in revenge.

Given as I had thoroughly thwarted a plan of his that was decades in the making and involved huge amounts of of his time, effort, and magic –not to mention mocked him to his face as I did so– Oliver's vengeance, should he ever get his hands on me again, was going to be absolutely bloodcurdling.

"Yeah, sure." I answered, my eyes sliding aimlessly away from the large man sitting in his chair.

"May I ask what the nature of your trauma under this Sorcerer was?"

I winced, instinctively rubbing my thumb over one of my opposite nails –smooth, shiny, and whole, it was still a novel sensation to me after months of cotton-wrapped, stinging, and nail-less fingers, courtesy of a casually malicious Oliver.

"Uh, torture, mostly."

"Mostly?"

"He poisoned me with arsenic once. Nonfatal dose."

"I see." the therapist's expression was drawn with sympathy as he looked up from his notes. "Do you feel comfortable describing the nature of that torture?"

I shrugged soundlessly. Truth be told, it was all a lot less traumatizing for me than I would've expected, a result that was perhaps brought about by the fact that I can and had wreaked horrific retribution of my own upon my abuser. (Torturer? Eh, whatever.) Also maybe the fact I had friendly support the whole way through afterwards.

"He, uh, sliced me with knives a lot." I said. "Never deep, just…just enough to hurt. Punched me a few times too. He couldn't do a super lot, see, 'cause then our visitors would've figured something hinky was going on. Didn't stop him from pulling out my fingernails, though."

Again I rubbed my clean, short nails, enjoying the enamel-like feel of my unpainted keratin, rather than the spongy pain of the exposed bed underneath. The therapist lowered his head to write.

"You seem to have adjusted to the aftereffects rather well." he noted. "Did you seek or receive any counseling?"

"Ah, no." I mumbled. I shifted in my seat. "I guess I haven't really thought about it that much."

That was true. After Oliver and his allies had been defeated and sent to an alternate dimension, I was too caught up in the high of finally being free of him/them, then the slog of recovering in a hospital, to really dwell on what he had actually done to me, in those weeks under his power. And after that, I was rushing frantically from one thing to another in the world of _Black Butler_ , constantly moving, moving, always thinking and doing and working, never really having a moment to settle and breathe, because if I wasn't working on something, then Ciel had me working on something for him. I was too busy playing catch-up with everything: with the plot of that world, with the skill sets of my opponents therein, with my own magical potential, to really pay attention to my own mental state.

But now? Here? Here I finally had a moment to think and stop and pause and _breathe_ , because the plot didn't need me and there were no immediate or impending threats to my wellbeing or anyone else's. In theory, I could fuck off on vacation for a couple months, spend the time lounging on a beach somewhere, and only come back after the Kishin was resurrected, and everything on my end would still be absolutely fine. I finally had leisure time to look back on my own mental state right now, and I wasn't quite sure I was liking what I found.

Hmm. Maybe I did need some therapy, if only to wrestle with all of these looming traumatic memories that I wasn't quite sure how to effectively handle on my own.

We talked a bit more on that general theme, with the therapist gently picking out details of my time under Oliver and my mental state because of it. This obviously wasn't his first rodeo in terms of trauma counseling, and I found my immediate reaction of fear easing. It wasn't healthy to bottle things up, but as he told me, I hadn't technically done that. I'd just been too preoccupied to really think on it, which _would_ have eventually been a problem, but now I had realized and acknowledged my trauma before I had hit that breaking point. It was how I dealt with things now that would truly shape my psychological outlook on those events: and, of course, he was absolutely here to help me, as was any other staff member of the DWMA.

Well, minus two on my meta-knowledge part: I wasn't talking with Spirit Albarn, the school's resident Death Scythe and Maka's father, because he was an unmitigated perv, and I wasn't acknowledging any kind of weakness to Justin Law, who while only a traitor in the manga, was still a traitor in the manga and therefore undeserving of trust until I ascertained just which adaption I was in. Good fucking luck with that last one on my part: unlike in _Black Butler_ , the _Soul Eater_ anime and manga only truly diverged at about the halfway point, and even then, both adaptions still had strong overlap. Another reason my meta-traveling checklist wasn't really urgent at this point: really, all I had to do right now was pinpoint when I was in the plot, and even then, if it was already past a certain point, that wouldn't matter much.

Anyways, according to the therapist, it was important that I monitor my emotional reactions to things around me, especially if they pertained to my trauma, and to let him or someone else know if I found myself developing adverse or increasingly adverse reactions to them. If I was comfortable with it, he'd tell Rex to look out for the relevant signs –I gave my consent for this, since the more people watching out the better, in my book. It was important that I acknowledged the fact I was absolutely safe now, and would remain so, and had the tools to defend myself and alert others if evil came knocking. I was not alone. I was not damaged, broken, or worse off for being those things even if I was. I was still a strong human being worthy of trust, respect, and affection.

Nice words nicely said, and all the better for being sincere, I still trotted on out of the therapist's office in a mood of concerned contemplation. Was I stupid for not considering my own mental state before, or just unobservant? Or was I unconsciously smart instead, since the attending confusion, concern, and _yes_ , trauma, would have been very badly handled indeed in the world and time period I had just vacated?

Eh. Another problem added to future me's pile. She was really going to hate me for all this.

To partially alleviate the woes and wrath of future me, Rex and I swung by the girls' dorm to pick up my stack of library books and then hopped on the Deathbus once again to return them and pick up some more…scientific volumes, afterwards. En route, I managed to sidestep any curiosity on just what the heck I was doing with these, and even to a certain extent what I was looking for, by peppering Rex with questions about the kind of books he liked. This was a tactic I had ample practice in, thanks to my friend Snake back in _Black Butler_ , who was truly the boomwormiest bookworm to ever bookworm, and had defeated me in single-quote combat to prove it.

Since we weren't in a tearing rush to go anywhere else and agreed to order pizza and eat in a park for dinner, Rex and I were able to lounge around the library, and I was able to boot up the huge, boxy old computer and look up the necessary information.

Filler bar blinking in and out, I stared blankly at the search database. I didn't have a fucking clue of what to search –interdimensional physics?

Taking a stab, I typed out "parallel universe theory" and hit search. A few articles popped up alongside the book search, and in my technology-trusting state, I clicked on one. Immediately, a wall of text popped up, and I winced backwards, squinting. Words like "Wilkinson Microwave Anisotrophy Probe," "cosmic inflation," "M-theory," and "black-hole cosmology" bounced off the insides of my skull, each theory less comprehensible than the last, and I slumped, groaning, in my seat.

Shit. Now I remembered why I hadn't tried looking into this in _Hetalia_ –the one time I'd tried, my brain had nearly melted from incoherent confusion.

Still, I was older and smarter now, and more importantly, _way_ more used to wrestling with uselessly obscure text and wrenching a concrete understanding out of it piece by screaming piece. If I could pry useful information out of dusty magic books in languages I barely even knew, I could definitely pick apart highly scientific and technical articles in English. Probably. Maybe.

Opening up a separate tab to search words I didn't know –and thus neatly answering my question of whether or not this world had internet– I began to parse through the first article.

First off, as I read and reread the first few paragraphs, it seemed as though the very possibility of parallel universes –that is, universes outside one's own– was a matter of contention in the scientific community. Arguments against included something about a "cosmological horizon," which sounded important. I flipped over to the second tab and searched that term, and found out that it basically meant how far we could observe things. Hence, going back to the first article, some scientists argued that being able to find parallel universes (even if they did exist) would be impossible because they were by definition beyond the point where we could actually retrieve information.

Interesting, but not viable. The very fact I was sitting here in front of this computer meant that parallel universes (or one of their many linguistic synonyms) were a thing. I scrolled down a little further, and found some meatier information.

It seemed some dude named Max Tegmark had developed a taxonomy (quick search said that basically meant "classification list") of various theoretical types of multiverses. The first sentence had me stumped with a slew of unfamiliar words –the kind that had you clicking through three different wiki pages to understand– but I slogged through them, eventually disentangling what the sentence actually meant. Apparently, the first level of multiverse was basically just an extension of the normal universe, since by the logic of the infinitely expanding universe, eventually every probability would happen. The second level banked off the first, but said that space/the multiverse as a whole was stretching and would stretch and expand forever, with some regions stopping and forming distinct bubbles or pockets, which would theoretically result in different properties and physical laws.

The third one was actually a theory I was familiar with thanks to science class, which stated that certain actions couldn't be predicted with absolute certainty, and had a range of possible outcomes: in theory, each of these possible outcomes corresponded to a different universe. In other words, if you threw a die, each of the six sides it could fall on represented a different possibility, and six different worlds in which that specific possibility was fulfilled.

The last theory was some jibber-jabber about external reality being a mathematical structure, and I skipped that over once I figured it wasn't going to give me anything useful.

Another guy, Brian Greene, had nine types of multiverse, some of which overlapped with the first scientist's. The first new one was the theory of a quilted multiverse, which would only work in an infinite universe. With an infinite amount of space, every possible event would occur an infinite number of times: however, the speed of light would prevent people from being aware of the other identical areas. Another, the brane multiverse theory, postulated that the entire universe existed on a membrane which floated in a higher dimension: in this dimension, there were other membranes with their own universes, and every trillion years or so, some would collide and thus create cyclic big bangs. This was in turn linked to the cyclic multiverse, wherein the universes bounced back and passed through time with every big-bag collision, pulling themselves together again and then colliding, destroying their old contents and creating them anew.

Another, and this one drew my attention, was the landscape multiverse, which said that quantum fluctuations change a certain space's energy levels, creating a pocket with a set of laws different from the surrounding space. The one after it was worthy of being marked out as well, the simple quantum multiverse, which said a new universe was created when a diversion in events occurred.

The name "Occam's razor" came up as I scrolled through the various theories, which after a headache-inducing series of searches told me was basically a snooty way of saying "the simplest explanation is probably the right one."

I was about ready to take an ax to the nearest physicist or cosmologist. Were _simple_ terms that hard to use!?

Muttering salty insults under my breath, I continued reading and scrolling and searching. Apparently, I had been wrong all this time in saying I was a dimension-hopper: the term "dimension" as it applied to parallel universes was not used in the scientific community. Most multidimensional –er, multiple universe theories postulated identical or nearly-identical planes of reality: basically, the only thing in an alternate universe that would be different was everything happening slightly to the right. Like me choosing strawberry instead of banana for my ice cream or something. There was something called the many-worlds interpretation, but that was what essentially amounted to infinite worlds of fulfilled separate possibilities branching off from a prior choice, much like my ice cream example.

Most importantly, as I came up for air with sore eyeballs and a ferocious headache, all of this quantum and multiverse and wormhole jibjab blatantly ignored or invalidated the possibility that I currently fulfilled, i.e. sitting in an alternate universe _completely_ against my laws of physics.

Well, okay, maybe the alternativeness of this universe had happened because some deific figure back before the dawn of time had made a different choice than they had back home, but how the heck could I prove a theory like that?! It was beyond the so-called cosmological horizon of even my magic!

Erk. Anyways.

As I flipped through more articles and occasionally got up to parse through some books, the trend continued. Science didn't acknowledge the possibility of such drastically different worlds as I found myself in, or if it did, it was in terms I barely understood. I was still on Earth in all three of the alternate universes that I had inhabited, but at different times and with slightly different laws of physics and magic. In _Hetalia_ , countries/nations could become personified and have sentient avatars: this included separate avatars of the criminal aspects as well, which was what Oliver and all his ghastly crew had been. In _Black Butler_ , the year had been 1889, and while nation avatars hadn't been in evidence, demons, Grim Reapers, and other such things certainly had. And here, of course: the sun and moon had sentient faces and were much, _much_ closer to the Earth than in any other world I had been to. The moon had been reached by a freaking blimp in the manga, after all, and people had walked, fought, and died on it without the benefit of spacesuits or even altitude adjustments.

But throughout all three of these worlds, I was still inarguably on the same planet, in the same galaxy, with the same continents, landmasses, and oceans, as well as the same basic presence of humans and generally-identical laws of magic and science. In theory, it wasn't implausible that what I considered very large deviations –the souls and species here, the magic in _Black Butler_ – were, on a cosmic scale, relatively minor. Even a lot of the history between all three of the worlds was largely identical, or at least as far as _Black Butler_ had advanced compared to the two others.

This was no good. I needed more information.

Bracing myself for another slew of incomprehensible words, I returned to the boxy old computer and typed in "time travel," since I was moving through time, technically, as well as space with all these adventures. As expected, a significant percentage of the scientific articles I pulled up were a complex tangle of technical quantum vocabulary words, but again, with slow, dogged, and hollow-eyed persistence, I managed to disentangle some of it.

Apparently, the biggest stumbling block for time travel even as a theory was something that could be condensed down into the grandfather paradox. Because events had already happened, attempting to change these events would create a contradiction, which obviously the universe and laws of physics as a whole would not allow. Therefore, traveling back in time was technically impossible, as merely being present might have effects, which would be disallowed by the universe. It was all very reminiscent of a short story from my high school literature class, _A Sound of Thunder_ , in which a time-travel company took bigshots back to the age of dinosaurs to hunt a T-rex. Everything was precisely calculated: the T-rex would've died anyway within seconds of their arrival due to a falling branch, and a levitating path kept them clear of the ground so that they wouldn't interfere in any way with the environment. One of the hunters panicked, however, and ran off the path, crushing a butterfly underfoot, and when they got back, English as a language had changed and a fascist dictator had been elected instead of the president they had left with.

According to my teacher, this was the origin of the term "butterfly effect" as it applied to science fiction, and it served as a good example of one of the arguments for why time travel probably couldn't work. The story was told in a linear fashion, of course, but time was linear as well, and therefore, as far as theories went, it was hypothetically impossible for someone to show up in the past, because the past had already happened. Things couldn't happen before they happened, that wasn't how physics worked.

Countering this (I think), was a theory done by some Russian scientist named Novikov. He proposed closed timelike curves, frequently abbreviated in the articles to CTC. His principle apparently asserted that in these CTCs, if there was an event that might cause a paradox or any change to the past in any way, then the probability of that event would be zero. Therefore, it would be impossible to create such an event to begin with. You could time travel and throw a rock at your past self to try and kill them, and a bird would miraculously fly in the way of it or something. This theory also eliminated the possibility of other worlds or timelines, though, making me frown.

Another article was about cosmic strings, but looking through those articles only told me how time travel might theoretically be possible, not the various laws tied around it. Essentially, since these apparent cosmic strings were under such stress or pressure or whatever, if you could bring them together or twang them or something, you could get the immense energy necessary to loop yourself back in time.

No matter how I scratched and pried at this implacable wall of text, I couldn't manage to claw out a concrete explanation, never mind a thorough understanding of it all. In plain bitter facts, much like how I had been unable to do much of anything noteworthy in _Black Butler_ due to my lack of magical experience, I just didn't have the PhD(s) to actually wrangle together all of these complex theories and theorems and cosmic principles into a single unified comprehensible force, especially as how it applied to me. This was string theory and quantum physics and a bucketload of other theoretical physicist bullshit in _fields_ I didn't even know about, never mind areas of study or topics. This was what it was, basically, and it was a teenager with two years of high school trying to tackle theories mooted about by professionals with at least a decade of secondary schooling. I could pry apart the general meaning of some of their articles, but when it came to understanding or, god forbid, _using_ their theories and equations, I was operating blind, deaf, and dumb.

Most especially dumb. I felt very dumb right now, even though there was no way in fresh hell that I could've had a prayer of understanding this stuff. Where would I have learned it? I hadn't even learned that much about basic introductory physics, for crying out loud!

Nonetheless, when I had spun out every last bit of research this library had and emerged groggy and blinking from the little computer nook to find my partner, I was in a _mood_.

"Hey. How'd your book search go?" he asked, glancing at me and standing up from where he had been tucked in a cushy armchair, reading a serious-looking book. "Did you find…um, whatever it was you were looking for?"

I gave him a smile that was mostly teeth.

"Rex, buddy, pal," I said genially as I patted my hand down on his shoulder, then gave an abrupt, tense squeeze. "I need to _vent_."

"…yes…?" he asked slowly, eyeing the hand gripping his shoulder with a wary but nonthreatened expression. Good to know I hadn't accidentally spooked him.

"You." I pointed to him with my free hand, then reversed it to jab a thumb at my chest. "Me. You are gonna transform and we are gonna go to a park or a practice range or something and absolutely _murder_ some inanimate objects."

"Okay…?"

I decided to prompt more independent thought and movement out of Rex by not grabbing his collar or something and dragging him with me, but rather beckoning him after me as I tromped out of the library with an aggrieved expression. Rex followed me placidly enough, which was good, though I slowed to an uncertain stop on the stairs. He stopped beside me on the same step, giving me an inquisitive look.

"Uh, so I kinda forgot about dinner." I said, rubbing the back of my head. "Go out for food and then vent?"

Rex grinned. "You don't know where the practice ranges are, either?"

" _It may be a factor._ "

My partner patted me on the back, tentatively at the first hit, then more normally when I didn't give an adverse reaction.

"I can show you." he said brightly, and we began down the stairs again, this time with him pulling ahead a little as he removed his wallet from his suit jacket and unfolded it. I noted with interest that his wallet broke from his monochrome theme and was red, just like the barrettes that clipped his right bangs to the side. "Since you had to do the medical examination fees and whatnot, I can pay for dinner."

"Sounds cool." I said. "We still on for pizza, or something else?"

"Pizza sounds good." Rex said as he pulled out a ten and then put both it, his wallet, and his hands back in his pockets.

I side-eyed him as we walked down the sidewalk. "Does it _actually_ sound good, or are you placating me?"

"It actually sounds good." Rex said with a half-smile which soon widened at my lack of retaliation. "We can get some breadsticks too, try to be healthy. Plus you probably deserve a treat after…um, whatever it was you were looking up."

I groaned and folded my arms behind my head as we kept walking down the street. "A bunch of highly technical, highly headache-inducing jibjab, and all of it summarily useless. Hence, me having a frustration-headache and wanting to alleviate that with hitting things, and since we're gonna aim for the EAT class anyways, I figure the sooner we start practicing our combat skills, the better."

Rex perked up. A golden retriever puppy that had just been offered a meat-covered bone would probably have been less chipper than he was at that moment: I could practically see his tail wagging, and he didn't even have one.

"R-really? Uh, yeah- yeah!" Rex blurted excitedly, straightening up in a bit of a hurry. "We can totally start after dinner! Um, how are you at baseball?"

I blinked several times.

"…say what?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: October 7th, 2020, 2.21 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: September 28th, 2020, 9.04 PM USA Central Time


	5. Trial Week: Day 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The redhead practicing near Arya is _M1LK T3A_ 's OC Tessa Johnson. More on her as she shows up, and of course all proper credit to _M1LK T3A_.
> 
> Also what kind of overachieving bullshit is it when I look at a chapter of some 4k words and go "Hmm. Seems kinda short."

_Arya's POV:_

After a quick pitstop for pizza, Rex led me to a building that soon explained why he had asked about baseball. Apparently, the quasi-batting cages that filled it were good places for DWMA students to practice their partnership, inasmuch as the actual physical act of wielding went: baseballs or tennis balls could be spat out at us, and we could practice our aim, or we could simply work on other forms of movement in areas that were designed to minimalize peer conversation and judgement.

Since Rex was the only one of us with a DWMA ID card, he was the one to sign us in, grab dibs on a cage, and register the equipment we'd be using. Well, he would if we _were_ using equipment –as I pointed out when he stopped by the rack of gloves and helmets, we were only now learning how to rely on each other as partners, and it was probably a bad idea to get pelted with projectiles at this stage even if it was in the name of practice.

Speaking of which…

At this time of evening, there wasn't really anyone else in the line of cages except a short chick about our age, practicing some kind of swing. Her thick, curly bright orange hair was tied back away from the piercings lining her ears, and other than a brief glance over her shoulder to check the sudden noise of us coming in, she ignored us.

"So like, when we get to EAT and go on missions and stuff, how is that gonna work with you?" I asked as we meandered down to our own reserved spot a few cages away. "I mean, am I gonna carry you, are you gonna be in human form, is it okay for you to come into contact with a magnet in Weapon form, or what?"

Rex blinked as he opened the chain-link door. "Oh, um, being around magnets isn't really a problem." he said. "You could probably have a magnetic backpack and stick me to that when you're not using me? Otherwise I can just follow you in human form, I mean."

I nodded and hummed in thoughtful agreement.

The reason for my concern was quite simple, and aptly demonstrated as Rex transformed before me in a flash of bluish light: his Weapon form was _not_ suited for easy carrying.

First off, the blade alone was at _least_ four feet long, with another six inches or so in the handle, which meant that when Rex was standing with his point buried in the scarred concrete beneath our feet, his flat pommel was at the level of my chin. Secondly, the blade itself was broad as hell, maybe a foot across at the base and only tapering a little in the last six inches. Rex was bulky, unwieldy, and might be easier to transport when it was him walking with his own two feet, regardless of whether or not he became miraculously light in my hands as a Weapon partner was supposed to be.

I regarded my transformed partner with silent interest, putting a hand to my chin. Unlike the original kind of buster sword, which I vaguely remembered to belong to the _Final Fantasy_ franchise, Rex didn't have any holes or slots in his gleaming black blade: like the original, though, he was more a cleaver than a sword (despite his size and length), with a thick back and tapering blade that led to a single edge. That edge gleamed a lighter grey along his entire blade, from the base all the way to the sudden, sharp diagonal at the tip of the sword, the only thing that saved it from being an oversized rectangle. His handle was bright red, and as I tentatively grabbed and lifted, felt like leather. There was no cross guard, no hilt to stop a blade from sliding off and into my wrists, but given as the rectangular base of the blade stretched for a good six inches on either side of the handle, a guard where I put my hands would've been slightly superfluous.

Rex was lighter than he looked –despite being a solid piece of metal nearly the size of me– but even so, I still needed both hands to properly lift him without feeling like he was going to bend my wrist in half, or to have any control over how his blade moved.

Humming, I flourished Rex carefully. He wasn't like any type of sword I had wielded before –back at my time in Weston, I had learned a bit on fencing, so I knew how to use a fencing sabre. Given as that was _fencing_ , though, it was a thin twiggy toothpick compared to this weapon. I'd also learned even less on the traditional knightly sword, which while bigger was still nothing compared to this bulky monstrosity. Also, that was double-edged.

Basically, though I kept this thought to myself, the buster sword was a terrible weapon. Big as the person that wielded it, the balance would be awful and the weight would be catastrophic, even in short bouts, and you'd need to be some type of eight-foot barbarian archetype to wield it with any finesse, rather than a 5'10 teenager trying her best.

In real life, that is. As a fantasy weapon, something that could be less than its obvious weight, it was…workable. There was still the problem of balance and just full-on unwieldiness to get over, and that was something to keep in mind as we practiced, but this was something I could achieve.

Besides which, Rex's mass would mean he'd come down like a meteor if/when I got around to wielding him properly, and the sheer momentum of swinging him would probably do half my work for me, when it came to cutting through flesh, bone, and unnatural exoskeleton.

This was doable. Yeah, I could work with this.

First things first, though, I had to work out the metaphorical kinks. My latest practice with a blade was with a fencing sabre, so there would need to be some mental adjustments and some habits to unlearn. With a sabre, the idea was to hit fast and precise, to dart and jab and pick holes in both the opponent's defense and their flesh, if it was an actual duel. As my fencing master had said, the whole point of fencing was to hit without being hit, and if you got struck, you'd done something wrong. It was all about maximum efficiency of movement, with tight, small actions that accounted for timing, distance, and strength.

Not exactly feasible with a buster sword.

Okay, sure, the efficiency of movement was definitely a habit I needed to keep, but you couldn't fucking _fence_ with something this big. It just wasn't possible. Not to mention Rex was the wrong type of blade for that kind of swordplay: single-edged and broad, not thin and edged on both sides.

Likewise, keeping the way I moved was important, bending my knees so that my center of gravity fell between my feet, maintaining my balance as I moved to attack or defend against imaginary opponets. But that, in and of itself, required adjustment, since Rex was much larger than the fencing sabre (and poker I'd practiced with after I'd left Weston) I had learned with, and also, the fact I needed both hands on his blade to control where it went meant that I couldn't take on the classical fencer poser that I had learned, one arm back as a counterweight and my body all in a neat, defensible line.

The combination of learning and unlearning was tricky, the more so because I had no guide apart from Rex's hums of acknowledgement and offered advice on his own weight and balance. Technically, I didn't know if the pose I eventually settled on was wrong, or if it would trip me up in an actual future fight. I tried to remember what moves I could as I passed his blade through the air at varying speeds, testing out how it worked before I committed to trying to use a move at attack speed, but again, most of my swordplay knowledge was from fencing, which was all about neat, economical movements that left no holes in your guard, minimizing the effect of the enemy's sword while you attempted to hit them right back.

This would _definitely_ take some adjustment. And a tutor, possibly –I remembered Akane Hoshi had a claymore for a Weapon (one Clay Sizemore), and eventually Tsubaki (Blackstar's partner) could take on sword form as well, but no one else, to my memory, used the common sword. No one _prominent_ , anyways. Stein could definitely _use_ a sword –his whole title as the DWMA's most skilled meister came in large part because, as his ex-partner Spirit said, Stein could pick up any Weapon and master it instantly– but he'd always used Marie or Spirit in the series, both in the anime and manga. (Marie was a hammer, Spirit was a scythe.)

So Stein was out, not just because he didn't use a sword currently, but also because he had the most acute Soul Perception in the entire series –unless you counted Maka in the manga– and thus would _definitely_ be able to bust me for magic-having crimes the second he laid eyes on me. Blackstar was out too, on the grounds that he was an unmitigated narcissist who would probably be so busy praising himself he wouldn't get around to actually teaching me anything –and the fact Tsubaki probably hadn't gotten that form yet, since it involved killing her homicidal brother on a mission in East Asia. Akane, maybe, since at this point he was probably busy bodyguarding Anya in the NOT class and/or investigating the Witch-induced Traitors. Anya was a princess, see, and part of the deal that allowed her to come to the DWMA mandated that she have a bodyguard.

 _Sword users, sword users…_ There was Blackstar, Akane, Mifune (but he was either independent or on a different side at this point), Crona (currently under the wicked sway of Medusa)…

Oh yeah, and Hiro, too. He'd used Excalibur for a bit, but Hiro was a pervy loser and he'd only been partners with Excalibur for like a single episode, before going right back to being the DWMA's communal gopher and whiny test dummy. I wasn't asking _him_ for help.

Hmm. Well, they probably had a teacher for this, right? I mean, the DWMA couldn't expect their students to pick up expert fighting skills merely from practicing with each other, right? Sid was a knife meister, which was _almost_ a sword, so maybe he knew a bit –really, him and Stein were the only teachers I knew at this point, and Stein technically wasn't even hired as official staff at this point. I vaguely remembered him grumbling in the _NOT!_ manga that he wasn't suited for teaching and that he only wanted to see autopsies, which was fair, coming from a guy that viewed everything in the world (himself included) as a potential test subject.

I brought this concern up to Rex after we'd been practicing for about two hours and he'd writhed back to normal in a flash of bluish light.

"It'd be an after-school thing." Rex said with authority as we tromped out, me a bit sweaty and sticky from all this involved work and heavy lifting. "Its why class gets out so early even though we're all technically boarders at the school, it gives us opportunity to sign up for extracurricular classes and things designed to help us out on our career paths."

"O~oh." I hummed. "So you think we should sign up for that? Like how to use a sword and stuff, since you're definitely not the type I was trained with and I'd like to, you know, avoid decapitation if and when we go hunt Kishin Eggs."

Rex laughed nervously. "You know I wouldn't let that happen." he said.

 _You'd be part of the problem, in that case._ I thought but didn't say. Until I learned just what exactly had happened with his first partner, I was not going to throw any potentially traumatic reminders of their potential demise right in Rex's face. That was just rude.

Not to mention it was just a dick thing to say to somebody who was concerned about you.

"We can talk more on the logistics of that tomorrow in class." I said with a yawn and a stretch, popping my spine loudly. "Right now I'm gonna go home and get a shower. See you then?"

"See you then!" Rex chimed, then gave me a worried look. "So, um, you _are_ going to sign the agreement tomorrow? I mean, you're definitely gonna join the academy?"

"Totally." I said. "Why wouldn't I?"

__

_**Time Skip***_

"So anyways, that's why I'm not sure I should go all the way through with this." I said, rocking on my heels a little from where I was gazing out the window. Ao was out sightseeing Death City with some of her friends, so for now I had the dorm room to myself, and I was making the most of it.

 _"Indeed."_ Britain hummed from the other line. _"Even with your assurance of the future acceptance of magic users within the academy, the current prejudice against Witches and the like –which you would identify as regardless of your intentions– is rather worrisome."_

"I figured I'd just be okay with that if I didn't use any magic." I said, absently walking across the room. That was a habit of phone calls with me –I couldn't really keep still. I had to move around. "My beef is with the fact that I can't really get any good books on the stuff I need to learn."

 _"You don't need to do everything yourself, you know."_ Britain said dryly. _"Dimensional physics and time travel, was it? I can easily arrange for some lists and learning to send through to you. Research on your end is all very well and good, but there's a limit to what you can understand in only a few years, never mind a mere month or two."_

"Don't I know it." I mumbled, rubbing my forehead. My head still ached, a little, from that fearsome wall of text, even after the cleansing and relaxing application of a hot shower and a soak in the dorm's sauna-sized public bath. My hair was still damp, pilled on top of my head to keep any annoying drips from rolling down my back and soaking into my combat pajamas.

_"Mm. It occurs to me, given the problems you have had so far, that further research is not only recommended, but necessary. We need to know what will happen to you next, or if you attempt to use that spell again even with alterations. You said this world was an anime just as ours was –what about the one you vacated?"_

"Also an anime." I said, pacing back to the desks and neatening my journal with one hand.

_"Hm…"_

"You think I'll keep going to different anime?" I asked nervously, and caught the rustle of a shrug.

_"It may be. It may be that you shall run the gamut of all the anime you know, then branch off, as it were, to other so-called fictional realms. It may be that you shall only go through all the anime you know. It may be that you have only been misplaced into these last two because of an error in the spell formula, an error that, once corrected, shall resolve with you going home as intended. I don't **know** , and neither do you."_

"Research?" I asked as I meandered over to the window again, idly swinging up my bare foot like I was kicking something.

 _"Research."_ he agreed. _"You said you'll be able to gain the trust of this Lord Death if you pass through the NOT class and create one of these "Death Scythes," yes?"_

"Yup."

 _"Then I recommend you focus on that. I can direct my attention towards researching your problem, as well as making the results available to you."_ His fingers drummed on something hard. _"I do recommend you brushing up on whatever material you can, however. You don't have the time to master this knowledge in its entirety, but it can only help to have a casual or semi-casual understanding of the topics I send to you."_

"Right." I said, trying and failing to sound enthused. "So you definitely think I should sign up?"

 _"I think that, failing that, your only other choice is to attach yourself to these so-called Witches and hope they have the proper manuscripts."_ Britain said. _"And you'd know better than I how wise that decision is or is not."_

I thought on the Witches I knew. Arachne Gorgon, cultlike mother of Arachnophobia, heretic Witch of the highest order and employer of such individuals as Giriko –who was basically brutal violence and unethical mayhem personified– and Mosquito, who was the epitome of everything dark about Monsters. Her sister Medusa Gorgon, abuser and manipulator extraordinaire, mad scientist alongside her Witch nature, proven to be more wicked than even the Kishin, who was the big bad of the whole series. Shaula Gorgon, the youngest of the three sisters, puppeteer and brainwasher of countless DWMA students, forcing some of those children to murder, malicious and with no sympathy for the value of human life or the bonds formed between other people. The Grand High Witch, Maba-sama, Queen of the Witch Order, who punished the wolfman Free for stealing her left eye by imprisoning him for so long that when he escaped 200 years later, he had forgotten his own name, and renamed himself as "Free" in celebration of his newfound liberty…even Eruka Frog and the Mizune sisters, who showed no hesitation at killing dozens of civilians despite their often comedic characterization.

"Yeah, I'll take the DWMA." I said, sweatdropping. What a complex collage of nastiness.

Sure, maybe I'd get away with working for Arachne for a little bit, but aside from the fact that she was pure manipulative evil, and that any help she gave would have about sixty different strings attached to it, _and_ that Arachnophobia was destroyed in both the anime and the manga in a very final (albeit mutually exclusive) fashion, I did not trust my theoretical coworkers as far as I could throw them. No one else had the textbook/manuscript ompf, except for Medusa, maybe, but I wasn't letting her get within the distance of a six-foot whacking stick.

Which I would slam into her face if I had the chance. Repeatedly. Until brains oozed out.

_Bitch._

But enough about Medusa, the scum of the earth. If Britain –the only current authority figure in my life that knew the entirety of my situation– said that this was a good idea, then I was going to take his word for it and go through with singing up for the DWMA. Tomorrow was Friday, the last day before we _had_ to sign the academy agreement if we planned on staying, and the day we got our IDs and so on: tonight was my last bit of grace period.

Granted, I wasn't super stressed about signing said agreement –I was more irked over the implicit amount of time it would take for me to turn Rex into a Death Scythe and start working on the stuff I needed, if I committed to this course of action. Plus, there was a nonzero chance that even the books in the forbidden section didn't have the stuff I needed, which meant I would've wasted all those months for nothing…not to mention the fact that I had no idea where to look next, aside from the Witches.

And, well. Witches. I could kinda get why the DWMA was so generally prejudiced against them.

So I was locked in with my "join the DWMA and make a Death Scythe" plan, at least for right now. Tomorrow, I could maybe do some sniffing around to determine the exact nature of when I was in the plot. As far as I could tell from the vague hints I'd come across so far –Sid still being alive, his partner Naigus not dressing with mummylike bandages, Meme Tatane being a birdbrain with goldfish memory, it not being Halloween yet– I was somewhere in the general timeline of _NOT!_ , but where specifically in _NOT!_ was something I'd have to do some digging on, if only because I didn't want to be poisoned and brainwashed by Shaula or one of her Traitors during a moment of unwariness.

 _"In any case, as you do have access to outlets in this world, we can arrange for more regular conversations."_ Britain continued as I eyed the nearby desk and the outlet beneath it, which was occupied by one lamp cord. Sure, I _had_ an outlet, but I was 90% sure that cellphones weren't really a thing, so I would need to disguise my phone when it was in the actual act of being charged. Maybe I could artfully have my apocalypse bag on top of both charger and cord as I sat at my desk pretending to do homework stuff. The downside of that plan was the fact that I'd have to stay up later than Ao, which was a squicky concept when I had to wake up at five in the morning and then climb a glorified mountain.

"Ah, right." I said, remembering. "Uh, I have to get up super early tomorrow to go to school, so we'd better wrap this up before my roommate comes back. I'll try to call you next Friday or something, yeah?"

 _"Of course."_ Britain said. _"Sleep well, Miss Thompson."_

"Mm-yup. Uh, you too, whichever time it is?"

He snorted. _"21.00, not that that means anything, given the amount of work I have left to do."_

I snickered. "Sucks to literally live the life of politics."

_"Oh shut up."_

"G'night Britain."

_"Ta."_

I hung up and slid my phone back into the pocket of my apocalypse bag, before shuffling around the room to prep the last few things before bed. Co-habituating with someone in a room before, I knew the general operating code of "be as courteous as possible," which meant turning off all the lights except one of the desk lamps and cleaning up the stuff from me that had gotten spread around over the course of the day. I also pulled the curtains securely shut, because I was paranoid like that and figured the less clues someone in the yard had about who was in the room, the better.

I'd debated on keeping my combat pajamas in this potentially-perverse atmosphere, but in the end, decided that these were what I was most comfortable in on a psychological and physical level, since the whole reason they were "combat" pajamas was the fact that both the black tank top and the old military fatigues were pieces of normal clothing that, pending some horrible disaster, I could run and fight in. My tank top wasn't really loose enough for me to squirm around so my bra was somehow exposed, and it being scandalously tight (which it wasn't) was a nonfactor when I was going to be beneath covers anyways.

_Nyeh, you perverse anime._

Thankfully for my peace of mind, the setup was very familiar to my room in _Black Butler_ , which had one very high window between the two beds and the door in the opposite wall, which was oddly so much more safe-feeling than having a window be at your back while the door was towards your front. Despite how much harder it would be to react to a threat coming from above your head or in front of your feet while lying down, it was still somehow scarier when there was no way I could lay without leaving my back exposed to a potential invader.

Eh. I'm sure there was some kind of psychological precedent for it.

I was still somewhat antsy for when Ao actually came in, since no matter how quiet she was there would probably be a burst of light and sound when she opened the door, but I had my alarm set for tomorrow and if I got lucky she'd come in either when I was barely getting to sleep or when I was already so deeply asleep it wouldn't matter.

I resolutely shoved the prickly anxious feeling about someone being in the room while I was asleep and unconscious away, and bunkered down beneath the covers as I shut my eyes.

_Problem for tomorrow's me._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: October 11th, 2020, 6.43 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: October 11th, 2020, 6.17 PM USA Central Time


	6. Trial Week: Day 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The delay for this particular chapter is because I was doing an art trade with someone and got. Like. WAY too into it. I wrote them two fics, with 73,000 words all total, in little under a month. Like its weird to think that I take so long with these, but am able to churn out such long chapters for something else in such a comparatively little time. I think its because _Hellsing_ (the fandom for those two fics) is something that's been near and dear to my heart since I pretty much started writing, so I am constantly In The Zone for it. All hours are _Hellsing_ -loving hours in my whacky messed-up brain. By contrast, even though I love Arya as a character, a lot of this particular fic and even her series as a whole is an exercise in writing practice for me, with things like chaining together different stories to form a long series without plot holes, exploring developing a character through said series without her becoming boring or OP, writing horror (which I'm not used to), and to a certain extent doing a bit of worldbuilding. It takes EFFORT, whereas _Hellsing_ is just me taking my monkey brain off its leash and letting it go feral.
> 
> This'll also probably be a bit of a boring chapter for those that have actually consumed the _Soul Eater_ series in any form, but it IS necessary for Arya as a person to do. We can check the wiki for things we forget about the series, she cannot. Plus a decent number of my fans from prior fics in this series have absolutely no idea what's going on, and actually do need this exposition.
> 
> Speaking of which, what I really like about _Soul Eater_ in particular is that, somehow, both interpretations manage to seem like high-quality fanfic of each other. The anime is like a fix-it fic for the manga. The manga is like a grimdark AU of the anime. I've never seen this in any other series and I think it's because, broadly speaking, somehow both the anime and the manga cover the same rough sequence of events. After the fight with BREW, Arachnophobia and Medusa's group starts making moves, Medusa enlists the DWMA to backstab Arachne, there's a fight between the DWMA and Arachnophobia, Medusa is killed and Crona's issues are resolved after she coerces him to betray the DWMA, the Kishin starts making everything worse, and the main trio fight Asura and beat him. The only difference between the anime and the manga is how they TREAT these events and what additional stuff happens alongside them. In the anime, Maka returns Crona to the side of good, and he actively confronts his bitch ovum donor and together with Maka they cast Medusa from Rachel's body and destroy her soul. In the manga, Medusa treats Crona with motherly kindness one (1) time after she takes him from the DWMA and brainwashes him, making his favorite meal and congratulating him for becoming the killer she wanted, even going so far as to hug Crona and say she loves him, which turns out to be a deliberate provocation to goad Crona into snapping utterly and killing her, thereby removing his last shred of stability and support and thus finalize her experiment turning him into a Kishin.
> 
> The lesson we take from this is fuck Medusa, no matter what the adaption.

_Arya's POV:_

By this point I had established my morning routine. Ao and I woke up to the shared beeping of our alarms, and we both silenced them more-or-less in tandem. Grabbing our toiletry bags, we'd join the great stream of sleepy and deceptively big-breasted adolescent girls shuffling down to the communal kitchen. Ao did whatever she did, I drank some orange juice, then returned to our shared room to do my morning exercise routine that consisted of various push-ups, curls, and stretching. Once that had been accomplished, I tromped back down to the communal showers –with a decent percentage of the other girls settling down to have a larger breakfast now that they were awake enough to handle it or gathering their effects– and stepped under a shower with the water turned up so hot it forcibly opened every pore in my body, basking under it for however long I could bask until I had to towel myself off, get dressed, and head on down to the bus stop, waiting with the other students who didn't have bikes, motorcycles, or cars to get them there ahead of the bus.

It pulled up, and I got in alongside the others, and then sat down by Rex, who would offer me a muffin or a scone or some other early-morning-pastry that was still slightly hot –apparently there was a bakery right next to the boys' dorm– and I would fork over a dollar in return (despite his protests), munching down my breakfast as Rex and I rattled on about whatever, Rex usually pulling out a baked good of his own and chowing down alongside me. We'd get to the school, drag ourselves up the mountainous stairs, and face whatever testing apparatus Sid and the other NOT teachers had arranged for us.

Not today.

Today, we signed the legally binding agreement that said yes, we were actually going to go through with this. We, the new NOT class, were going to become DWMA students with all that that entailed, risks and rewards alike.

Rex was actually kicked out of the room for this, alongside what I presumed to be the other old NOT students: people that, like him, had only just found partners in this particular semester, or were even still partnerless, and had all already signed the DWMA agreement ages ago.

It took the form of a white sheet of paper with a black box on the margins, scrollwork in the corners and a header with –of course– Lord Death's iconic mask emblazoned over a black splotch of slightly ominous wavy lines. Inside this border was the actual agreement itself, and lawyers stood by in discreet corners of the room to help anyone who was having problems with the language or the legality. I didn't have much problem there: the entire paper was basically just a terms-and-agreements type thing, in which I wrote my signature on the bottom line and said yes, I understood and would obey all the rules set out on the rest of the contract.

Most of them were normal school rules, but there were a couple things that were more anime-esque. For one, students apparently might come across confidential information inside the academy, and we weren't allowed to discuss any of the information we saw, overheard, or pieced together outside the academy grounds without teacher permission. For another, we weren't allowed to sue the school in the event of our kidnapping, death, mutilation, rape, or torture, as we understood that we were taking a risk upon publicly and legally aligning ourselves with the academy and the consequences thereof was on us.

Something that made me grin as I saw it, the rule that if there was a fight on school grounds, at least one faculty member had to be present to witness it. That was an old rule, going all the way back to when Blackstar and Soul had decided to be each other's partners and then kick the ass of an enrolling Death the Kid on his first day of school –something that had been witnessed by Stein on his first day as a teacher, as a matter of fact, and had ended in utter, complete, humiliating defeat for Soul and Blackstar. But then, what could they expect, fighting without their actual partners? Even Blackstar, who was the best combative student in the academy by far, still wasn't much when he was fighting solo against a Grim fucking Reaper.

Especially when it was just the beginning of his character arc, but whatever.

Other stuff I knew –hunting souls without academy permission/outside Lord Death's list was forbidden, over-hunting souls was forbidden, students could be expelled if they failed all of their class subjects or if they were EATs with poor performance in soul collecting/remedial lessons, they could also be expelled if they broke the terms of this agreement, and so on.

More new information made me raise my eyebrows: an execution order from Lord Death was needed to hunt a Witch, meisters and Weapons could not undertake extracurricular activities without their partner(s), and perhaps most relevantly for me, towards the end of the list, _In the event of an emergency, students are allowed to walk into the Death Room without permission._

The phrasing of that implied that one needed to have permission to enter the Death Room at any other time, and I suppressed a groan of disappointment as I slumped in my chair.

Still, barring that, nothing else important jumped out, and I scratched out my signature, then walked up to the front of the room to turn it in. This wasn't one of the lecture halls, but rather a larger auditorium with no furniture that I vaguely thought might've been the same hall that everyone was in on the DWMA anniversary when Medusa activated her plan –and her trap– and locked everyone inside said room for about 45 minutes, even Lord Death.

You could do that when you had a werewolf who specialized in spatial magic on your side, I guess. Maybe _Free_ would know some of the stuff I needed to find out about to understand all this universe-hopping.

I passed the academy agreement to Naigus, who read me my metaphorical rights, ensuring that yes, I absolutely meant to do this, before waving me on to stand against a light blue background. I was told to look at the camera and try to assume a neutral expression, which I did to the best of my ability. Naigus clicked the button, the camera flashed brightly, and she waved me back over as she began typing on her monstrous boxy dinosaur of a computer –it was about a foot thick behind the screen, with clunky plastic lining the screen itself. It looked like it would crackle and spit out a fax message from one of the vents at any second…or maybe that was just my new-age millennial mindset talking. Anything older than a laptop seemed ancient to me.

"This ID card will allow you to access DWMA facilities, including the Deathbus, free of charge." Naigus said briskly as she typed things out. "Losing it subjects you to a penalty, so I suggest you put it somewhere you can keep close tabs on it. If your ID is stolen, report the theft _immediately_."

"Yes, ma'am." I said promptly, remembering that there was probably a nonzero amount of shapeshifters in this world. Valid ID was probably all that stood between some of them and infiltrating the school.

"Your ID will be updated with every new rank you achieve. You said you wanted to aim for EAT?"

"Yup."

"A new card will be issued if and when you accomplish that ranking." Naigus continued, hitting one last key with finality and turning to another, smaller machine beside the computer. She selected an empty plastic card and fed it into one end, pressing another button as the machine whirred and sucked it in. "As will one if you become a two-star meister. Please destroy any and all prior DWMA ID cards upon receiving your new one."

With one final whir and slightly destressing noise, the machine spat out my card proper, and Naigus gave me a warm smile as she handed it over.

"Welcome to the DWMA."

I grinned at her and nodded, taking my card and trotting off. As I did, I turned it over, looking at the plastic card with interest. The fresh photo of me (looking slightly nonplussed) was on the upper middle left, with the caption **STUDENT** underneath it inside a black bar, with an ID number underneath that consisting of nine digits. Beneath this in red (fine) print was a warning, _This student ID card cannot be used as a replacement for law enforcement badges or qualifications in any country._

To the right of my picture was my name, Arya Thompson, with the words _Death Weapon Meister Academy_ in elegant orange cursive underneath it, divided by a floating black line. Beneath all of this were three large stars, one of which was filled in with rusty orange, denoting my ranking as a 1-star meister, and taking up the remaining bottom-right quadrant was a three-by-three table listing my fine details.

The first row described me in order as _Meister, Female_ , and my classroom as _NOT 011_ , with the second row listing off particulars such as _H: Blonde, E: Brown,_ and _Blood: O+_ , with the final row detailing, NOT, USA, and finally Med. None.

I wondered if it was a bit macabre of them to list my medical information like that, but then again, as far as I understood it, if I majorly fucked up and got myself injured by someone targeting DWMA students regardless of class, an EMT could just fish out my ID and immediately have all the information they needed to keep me alive on the way to the hospital –my blood type and whatever underlying medical conditions I might have.

But still, with this tucked inside my wallet and my wallet zipped inside my pocket –which was a blessed if slightly jarring clothing advancement that I was still getting re-used-to– I was officially, indubitably, absolutely a member of the DWMA, and as such my general course had been plotted out. This was the side I was on, these would be the people I was fighting with and for. Sure, betrayal and backstabbing and lost options might happen down the line, but it wasn't likely, and I could prepare for it in my own little way.

Flashing the ID to Rex, he gave me a giddy smile and we exchanged a hearty and deserved high-five, before retiring to the sidelines to talk shop as we waited for the other students to finish signing things and getting their own IDs printed. As before, Rex was enthusiastic in telling me about the highly overdramatic plots of the operas he listened to, and I was surprisingly invested in interesting, since before I had vaguely dismissed most operas as being nothing more than wailing in various tones with some random background/costume changes thrown in for aesthetic and flavor. No, apparently there was a plot to most of these, and all the loud arias and solos and whatnot were deep, highly theatrical expressions of said characters or thoughts.

Basically, opera was extra as shit, and hearing about it was fun, even if I wasn't quite sure that I wanted to watch one live, or a video thereof. My closest experience with such things was a _Phantom of the Opera_ soundtrack on my phone from what was apparently one of the shittier movie adaptions, but whatever.

Anyways, eventually the class was filtered through in its entirety, and we were gathered up and hustled along to a welcoming party. I was surprised by the warmth of it: most school parties like this were token opportunities to pay lip service to the idea of welcoming in new students/income, and basically containing little more than a thinly veiled introductory speech, explaining more about the school and the students within it. This, though, this was…genuine. The old crop of students were genuinely welcoming and trying to get to know the new ones, the food was actually really good, and you could feel the bonds being offered and formed.

Rex and I, by unanimous awkward assent, kind of shuffled over to the edges of the room, watching the other NOT and even some EAT students –it seemed we couldn't escape the introductory speeches entirely– hang out and get to know each other. People were still… _weird_ around Rex, I noticed out of the corner of my eye, not-quite-pointing at us and whispering behind raised hands and averted expressions. I still couldn't pick apart the exact nuances what their expressions –some pitying, some smug, some concerned– actually meant, but given my luck, it was something that was going to bite me in the ass later.

Eh. It wasn't a problem quite yet.

With the preliminary work all done, though, totally done and with nothing left for me to do except plot my advancement through the curriculum, I was able to take a mental step back and assess my assets and resources –more specifically, tick back on what I knew of the canon characters and their personalities, relationships, and future history. I'd have to write it all down, of course, but doing that in Italian was probably safe enough, _and_ would keep my skills sharp in that language. I could actually speak Italian, French, and German organically, whereas the other two more esoteric languages in my roster –Latin and Greek– had been more or less magically uploaded into my brain. Sure, I could read and speak them, but I didn't _understand_ either language –the meaning was instantly transferred through to my mind, which made spontaneously writing the words out instead of copying them over from something somewhat difficult. There was also no point in maintaining my so-called skills in those two languages: I understood them because of magic, and that magic wouldn't wear off, so I would keep right on understanding them until the day I died.

I did sometimes regret magically forcing Latin and Greek into my brain, even if studying them normally would've taken years before I could actually use that knowledge.

Still, Rex and I were able to chatter amicably enough as I pulled a notepad and pen out of my little bookbag/satchel (which made me feel absurdly anime-protagonist-y) and started writing, our discussion serving as both a good background noise and a distraction keeping him from paying attention to what I was doing.

First off, the where and when. Today was August 29th, which meant that I had roughly two months between now and the finalization of _Not!_ , when Sid died and Shaula Gorgon made her power-grab on the day of the Death Festival, Halloween. Between now and then was a nebulous series of shenanigans between Tsugumi and her two partner candidates, as well as Shaula's own diabolical plots.

I started a new paragraph, quietly thanking the fact that no one else was around me and Rex, by his own admittance, couldn't understand Italian.

`Shaula Gorgon –scorpion Witch, younger sister of Medusa and Arachne, uses venom(?) in jewelry (like rings) to infect and brainwash DWMA students. Also uses Traitors (as test subjects towards perfecting the venom?) to attack and cause trouble prior to DWMA attack.`

`Timeline:`

`Brainwashes Meme Tatane. Increased strength(?) of brainwashing/venom causes memory issues like omnipresent temporary amnesia and unknowing existence as a spy for Shaula inside DWMA.`

`Starts infecting/using Traitors. Individuals seek out DWMA students and attack them: they have no prior record of combat experience or aggression, baffling DWMA investigators, including Sid and Akane Hoshi.`

`Has blanket at a Death Bazaar sale. Uses ring to infect Eternal Feather, NOT upperclassman, and has her attack members in the crowd with Weapon form. (Butterfly knife.) Eternal Feather confronted by EAT students Maka Albarn and her partner Soul, witnessed by Tsugumi, Meme, and Anya. Brief confrontation, before Shaula tests her poison's strength by forcing Eternal Feather to kill herself via slicing her own neck open.`

`Plots? Goes to ground? Does not move until around the time of the Death Festival.`

`Apparently anticipates some kind of trap laid for her or her spy. Kills/infects much of investigatory squad and lures Sid to his death via a brainwashed Meme Tatane.`

`Death Festival. Shaula strikes and infects a wide swath of the DWMA populace, turning them against each other much like a zombie flick, and confronts Tsugumi and Anya, who have come with a cure for Meme. The trio fight, break the brainwashing, and then reconcile, with Tsugumi choosing both meisters as her partners. They kill Shaula.`

Still half-listening to Rex's conversation, I hummed and responded in all the right places, starting another list.

`Tsugumi Hardori:  
Soul Eater Not! main protagonist. From Japan, shy, kind of moe. Insecure over flat chest, lack of transformation skill, being at DWMA, etc. Black hair usually in pigtails, copying Maka. Black sailor fuku with white tie that looks like Lord Death's mask. Indecisive and reluctant to offend people, hence her lack of immediate choice at the beginning of the series between Meme and Anya. Weapon form: halberd. Possibly has the same anti-demon/anti-magic Wavelength Maka has? Sources unclear.`

`Meme Tatane:  
Tsugumi's partner/meister. Initially birdbrained, is actually a highly skilled fighter and very determined. Very well-endowed, frequently serves as fanservice during gym scenes, as she usually wears a sweater/jumper otherwise. Provides comedic relief outside of Tsugumi and her insecurities. Brainwashed by Shaula up until Halloween.`

`Anya Hepburn:  
Tsugumi's other partner/meister. Has a much longer real name, fills the role of snooty rich blonde girl. Huge tsundere, wants to experience "common" life as she's become tired of living in a castle and wants freedom. Hails Tsugumi as "Goddess of the common people" due to her being average at literally everything. Is secretly guarded by Akane Hoshi and Clay Sizemore due to being a member of the royal family.`

`Akane Hoshi:  
An EAT student who works under Sid in some way. Central Intelligence Agency or something? Is comfortable and practiced at going undercover in NOT to protect Anya, takes over case when Sid dies. Spiky black hair and glasses, hair falling over left side of his face to hide the distinctive star pupil therein. Other eye normal? Star Clan is a branch of his family's dojo, which teaches the old, fatal ways of martial arts. Formal, something of a perfectionist, intensely loyal to DWMA. Helpful and courteous, still teases his partner sometimes. Can use Soul Force attack, possibly also Soul Perception.`

`Clay Sizemore:  
EAT student, Akane's partner. More laidback than Akane, also flusters and panics under direct pressure of being questioned. (Could not even answer 2+2 when surprised with it.) Not very good at coming up with immediate covers –serves as the comedic relief to Akane's seriousness during Not! Blond hair, white shirt, nondescript. Weapon form: great sword/claymore.`

`Sid Barrett:  
Three-star meister and faculty member at DWMA. Appears both in Not! and in main series. Very much a professional, well-known and respected by students and other faculty members alike. Caring and protective, but somewhat strict and by-the-rules –obeys the letter of the law and is incredibly loyal to both Lord Death and the school. Catchphrase: "That's the kind of man I am/was." Originally black man with dreadlocks, becomes purple (rigor mortis?) after reanimation. `

`Sid raises Blackstar after the Star Clan is exterminated, and at some point becomes a teacher. Taught Soul and Maka's EAT class, also helped out with NOT a lot. Part of the DWMA Central Intelligence Agency or whatever, keeps track of Witches and other enemies and engages in covert operations and special ops. Was investigating Shaula Gorgon through her Traitors, eventually set a trap for either her or Meme and was unfortunately decoyed into an ambush in turn. Killed by an uprooted copy of the Statue of Liberty with the pointy part of the torch through his skull. (WHICH IS SOMEHOW POSSIBLE?) `

`Referred to as the "statue-through-the-forehead/Goddess of freedom to the face" incident by EAT students later in the main series, when both it and he are first introduced. Sid's body was sent to Stein, who turned him into a zombie. (Mind still intact.) Sid and Stein then work to trick Maka, Soul, Blackstar, and Tsubaki in a remedial class to improve their skills, pretending that Stein was an unknown antagonist that reanimated Sid for the purposes of attacking DWMA students. Sid later rejoins the academy, still as a teacher, and is sent to investigate Medusa when Stein's suspicions are aroused. He finds and assesses her lab, and barely manages to escape the ensuing trap to warn the DWMA. Following this, he participates in several other missions of espionage and special operations, including the attack on the magnetic island for BREW and on Arachnophobia's base, as well as several Arachnophobia outposts.`

`Mira Naigus:  
Sid's partner, Weapon form: combat knife. Some type of instructor within the DWMA? Position unclear, aside from general helpfulness/homeroom-teacher-ness for NOT class. Also becomes interim nurse after Medusa gets her skank snake ass kicked out of the academy. Serves alongside Sid during missions, second in command and also apparently good at setting traps and other such things. Calm and professional, can also become passionate when someone else makes mistakes, usually scolding the offending party, sometimes harshly.`

`Maka Albarn:  
Main character. Female meister with ash-blonde hair in pigtails, green eyes. Slender and short, flat-chested and self-conscious about it (hi anime cliché), usually wears white blouse and yellow sweater vest, alongside green striped tie and long black trench coat. Trench coat is usually buttoned so you can only see her tie, white collar, and short red plaid skirt. Cloak of coat bells out around her ankles –she wears cartoonishly oversize boots with white buckles, and also wears white gloves when wielding Soul.`

`Bookworm, always has a book, straightlaced, determined, courageous (key character aspect!), hardworking. Maka hates her father due to messy divorce and wants to make Soul into an even better Death Scythe than him –petty as hell. Short temper for comedy moments, holds a grudge for a long time, but is usually clear-headed during a fight. Insecure over her relationship with Soul for a variety of reasons, not the least of which because Soul often carries her during the early stages of their partnership. (Also because Soul is hypnotized by curvaceous women and again, issues with womanizing dad and self-image.) Has a signature technique, "Maka Chop," in which she whacks the offending party over the head with a book, frequently to the point of comedically indenting their skull and making them gush blood.`

`Part of later Spartoi unit, becomes a two-star meister. Has one-in-50-million Grigori soul, which allows her to use flight through the intermedium of magic or a Weapon. (Uses Soul.) Only other known Grigori is Gopher, who is a villain. Also possesses anti-demon/anti-magic Wavelength, allows her to destroy evil when properly harnessed and used in a Resonance attack, such as Demon/Genie Hunter, Kishin Hunter, etc. Her ability to see souls is eventually her strongest ability, enough so to catch the Kishin on the moon (manga) and Crona from across the world (anime). THEREFOR AVOID AT ALL COSTS AFTER SHE MEETS STEIN!`

`Soul "Evans" Eater:  
Maka's partner, Weapon form: scythe. Albino(?) male with spiky white hair, red eyes, and sharp teeth. Wears not-quite letterman jacket and headband, later switches it out to orange shirt and black (leather?) jacket. Lazy, aloof, obsessed with being "cool," has some kind of familial inferiority complex tied with music and his big brother Wes, therefore does not like to play the piano in public despite being extraordinarily skilled at it. Stubborn, headstrong, BFFs with Blackstar.`

`Very loyal to Maka, despite being often distracted by pervy shenanigans, and ultimate ride-or-die despite their occasionally rocky relationship. After being attacked by Crona in Italy during Crona's introduction, gains a scar slashing across his chest, as well as infection of black blood that manifests as a little demon/ogre/whatever in a piano room in his mind that tries to tempt him into Madness. Uses music to harness Soul Wavelength, can spread Maka's anti-demon/anti-magic Wavelength through this medium to other people. Joins Spartoi with Maka.`

`Blackstar:  
Secondary main character. Male meister with spiky bright blue hair and green eyes, tattoo(?) of a five-pointed star on his right shoulder that is a shade lighter than his normal skin tone. (Same star is on the toes of his boots and backs of his fingerless grey gloves.) Has sleeveless black shirt with high funneled collar and weird white baggy pants that are black below the knees. Also has some kind of grey riveted strips that serve as scarf, belt, and trimming on his collar. Not particularly tall, but muscular.`

`Arrogant, narcissistic, superiority complex, tactless, typical loud shounen hero. Rushes into things without thinking, loyal to his friends but very loud. Most combatively powerful meister in the DWMA, can attack directly using his soul (Soul Force) but can barely sense other souls and whatnot. Highly attuned five senses. Has ambitions to transcend humanity and become a god, which he achieves in the manga but not the anime. `

`Tsubaki Nakatsukasa:  
Secondary main character. Female Weapon, has multiple forms inherited from her family: chain scythe (kusarigama), smoke bomb, shuriken (several feet across), ninja sword (more like a dagger though?) and eventually a katana after she kills her brother. Tallest of the main cast, long black hair kept in a ponytail, dark blue eyes, has a sleeveless cream dress with same riveted grey bands as Blackstar as a sash. Yellow star on the left breast. Better endowed than Maka, occasionally used as fanservice as such, though not frequently. Has gloves/bandages/detached sleeves(?) with a tiny star near the wrist.`

`Accommodating, mature, practical, often serves to temper Blackstar's exuberance and energy. Polite, gentle, definitely one of the -dere archetypes, but still is not a complete pushover, as evidenced by her duel with her brother. Has multiple Weapon forms due to being a direct descendant of one of the first Weapon families made by Arachne. Completely loyal to Blackstar and the DWMA by extension however: family moved away from Arachne's influence at some undisclosed time.`

`Death the Kid:  
Secondary main character. Male meister, also the son of Lord Death and a Grim Reaper. Black hair with three white stripes on the left side –source of much consternation, as he has OCD and is obsessed with symmetry. (Lines are ONLY on left side.) Wears a black suit with symmetrical bars on the sleeves and down the front, as well as a grey metallic Lord Death mask like a tie under his collar. Yellow eyes with two different shades, very unique. Also has rings on each middle finger with a band of three bars and a centerpiece of a Lord Death mask. `

`Obsessed with symmetry, which is used for comedy towards the start of the series when he will collapse and have a hissy fit over unsymmetrical things, including mention of his own hair. Otherwise very cool and composed, can still become angry when people disrespect or blaspheme the DWMA's idea of order. Loyal and respectful to his father, Kid will still defy and question him, such as when he enrolls in the academy, asks about the Kishin, or begins to learn about Eibon. Uptight and a bit of a perfectionist, but has the power to back it up: is many leagues above his fellow students when it comes to fighting, at least at the beginning of the series. Has two Weapon partners, one of the only two known meisters to do so. Can sense souls, but not nearly as well as Maka. Apparently immune to toxins and hair dye? Also likes skateboarding tricks, apparently. Shoots his guns UPSIDE-DOWN?! Pulls trigger with his pinkies!? Weird dude.`

`Liz Thompson:  
Secondary main character. Weapon form: pistol. Older of the two sisters, long dirty blonde hair and blue eyes. Wears red sleeveless turtleneck belly shirt (why?) with white tie and jeans. Has silver bracelets and a cowboy hat too. `

`Very stereotypically American teenager, obsessed with fashion, makeup, etc. and more mature than his sister, Patty. Jaded and cynical, was the leader of the duo when they were in Brooklyn. Was apparently high when she tried to mug Kid, who later captured her and Patty and offered them parole if they became his Weapons, as they were both symmetrical in Weapon form. Originally agreed in order to milk Kid for everything he was worth, eventually grew to respect and care for him as a loyal partner. Terrified of ghosts and the supernatural, such as monsters, and collapses in a puddle of tears when confronted by them.`

`Patty Thompson:  
Secondary main character. Weapon form: pistol. Younger of the two sisters, short blonde hair and blue eyes. Wears red sleeveless turtleneck belly shirt (why?) with white tie and puffy jean-shorts. Has silver bracelets and a cowboy hat like her sister: is also shorter and more curvaceous.`

`Childish, playful, apparently simple-minded and naïve, also has a violent and sadistic streak that was displayed more obviously when she and her sister were living in/terrorizing Brooklyn. This aspect can come up during fights or other situations, and can mix to a gleeful sort of aggression that is aimed at whoever she and the others are fighting. Enjoys teasing her sister's fear of ghosts and the supernatural, often makes art projects and other things absentmindedly.`

`Doctor Franken Stein:  
Main cast member. Male teacher, short silver-grey hair, round glasses, very tall –tallest in cast? Also muscular and athletic much like Blackstar. Has a giant screw sticking out of his head, which he will twist when wanting to adjust his mood (?) or focus. Makes a loud clicking sound as he does. Also covered in blanket stitches from past experiments on himself, with a crescent of them going across his right cheek. Wears a turtleneck made out of various patches of grey cloth, also sewn with obvious blanket stitches, and a lab coat with more of the same. Cigarette addict, can exhale a Lord Death mask out of smoke.`

`Sadistic, eccentric, views everyone and everything in the world as a test subject, himself included. Macabrely curious about everything, very susceptible to the influence of Madness. A good teacher despite this, also the most skilled and powerful meister to ever graduate from the DWMA (until Blackstar in the manga.) Can use Soul Force to attack directly, can also instantly master any Weapon he shows an interest in due to his highly flexible soul and supreme control over his own Wavelength. Can fight Maka and Blackstar during the earliest stages of the series while sitting on a rolling desk chair, can also beat them barehanded. Has a very powerful ability to perceive the nuances of other people's souls, even when those people are still alive, which is apparently the highest form of that ability. ALSO ABSOLUTELY AVOID AT ALL COSTS!`

`Spirit Albarn:  
Male teacher, Lord Death's current Death Scythe. Weapon form: scythe. Maka's father, red hair and black suit with a tie that looks like an upside-down cross. Womanizer, desperate to earn Maka's approval, recently divorced from her mother, apparently unable to stop flirting with women no matter how much Maka despises him for it.`

`Blair:  
Roommate (?) of Maka and Soul after they fail to kill her in the first episode. Cat Monster, can transform from a purple-black cat to a very buxom human woman. Wears a black witch hat and cutout dress, or sexy underwear. Most frequent vector for fanservice, has a bit more of a personality in the manga. Can use pumpkin-themed magic, frequently explosive.`

`Medusa Gorgon:  
First main antagonist. Yellow eyes and hair, which is short and spiky but has two long strands that frame her face and are twisted into a braid below her chin. Wears black pants and a sleeveless black hoodie with eye markings on the side of the hood. Usually barefoot, except when she's in disguise as a human nurse, has stylized snake tattoos on both arms that are actually magical lifeforms she can control.`

`Highly manipulative, highly intelligent, highly evil, a grave threat to both the DWMA at large and any individual teams that encounter her. Physically, emotionally, and psychologically abusive to her child, Crona, has shown no remorse for any of the above, ever. Has "a thousand snakes" inside her body that she can use for wiretapping and physically infiltrating a person's body –removing said snakes with force and speed will rip the person apart from the inside. She can also pop her tattoos off of her body and use them to attack without removing her Soul Protect. Highly dangerous. AVOID AT ALL COSTS.`

`Crona:  
Child of Medusa, varying between antagonist and protagonist depending on time and adaption. Pink hair chopped sort, with several long strands on his bangs, dull blue-grey eyes, long black robe with high white collar and white cuffs. Very skinny, canonically gender ambiguous. (Uses gender-neutral pronouns in Japanese, referred to as "he" in English dub.) Occasionally has Ragnarok sprout from his spine/back as a spray of coalesced black blood in humanoid form. `

`Cripplingly insecure and unstable, catchphrase is "I can't deal with BLANK" and/or, usually in moments of extreme madness/insanity, "My blood is black." This is due to his blood being a melted-down form of the demon sword, Ragnarok, who is still a sentient being inside his body. Crona can use every drop of his blood as a weapon, as well as defensively, hardening his body and stopping any wounds he does take from bleeding. He can fly by sprouting wings of black blood, as well as use three different swords (in the manga) with Ragnarok sprouting an extra arm from his back. Frequently uses sonic and sound-based attacks.`

`Ragnarok:  
Former Weapon, now demonic black figure attached to Crona through the medium of blood. Appears as a cartoonish, muscular black humanoid form, with white spiked straps wrapped around his right shoulder and wrists, and white gloved hands. There is also a white X across his face, and his eyes are white with Xs for pupils. More spikes extend from the sides of his head. He can also shift to a less humanoid form with tattered black wings and an elongated face. His sword form is a black broadsword with a white stripe down the center, with the same spiked straps wrapped around the hilt to form a guard. He also has a red mouth near the lower part of the blade.`

`Ragnarok is loud, hungry, and rude, often Crona's opposite in terms of mortality and aggression. He often bullies Crona despite being conjoined to him, and is highly bloodthirsty. When Crona uses Scream Resonance, Ragnarok's blade vibrates like an electric saw, and can injure Weapons even in their metallic form. (Death Scythes are apparently strong enough to shrug off this effect.) `

`Eruka Frog:  
Frog Witch, long silver hair, polkadot black and white dress, orange witch hat. A somewhat weak Witch that uses frog-based transformation magic (can shapeshift into a frog) and is adept at summoning bombs. In thrall to Medusa due to Medusa having planted a number of snakes inside her body, which will kill her if she disobeys or tries to leave. Friends with the Mizune family, including the eldest sibling, who was murdered by Medusa to demonstrate the effectiveness of the implanted snakes when Eruka and Mizune attempted to kill her for meddling with the DWMA and potentially bringing down a threat on every Witch in the world.`

`Mizune:  
A clan of mouse Witches with pink hair and striped black and white dresses. Can combine into multiple forms with two, three, and five of the siblings, each resulting in a slightly taller and less cartoonish singular form, which acts as one entity. Can uses lazerbeam-like whiskers from any point in their body, which slices through body concrete and flesh with ease.`

`Free:  
Muscular man with spiky brown hair and striped prisoner outfit, or black shirt and olive-green pants. Immortal due to apparently being part of the "immortal clan," cannot be killed by anything we see in the series. Stole the Grand High Witch's eye, which is now his –his eyebrow above it has been replaced by the words NO FUTURE strung together, and the eye itself is white except for a red pentagram consisting of several triangles inside each other within a circle. Powerful but clumsy, often serves as comedic relief. Can be clever, however, and is skilled in using spatial magic to project images, use ice, and on one occasion lock even Lord Death inside a certain space, albeit with help and only for 45 minutes.`

`Justin Law:  
Blond, indigo eyes, priest cassock (with a white skullcap?) and cross necklace with a Lord Death skull on it. Male guillotine Weapon and Death Scythe, in control over some part of Europe. Works alone, always has his earbuds in, characteristic for listening to music constantly and being able to read lips. Has a rivalry with Giriko that persists even after her falls into Madness (in the manga.) Also gains horrific burn scars in the manga that stretch up the side of his face.`

`Marie Mjolnir:  
Female death Scythe, Weapon form: hammer. Blonde, amber eye, black eyepatch. Wears black dress with yellow zigzags. Marriage obsessed for…some reason?…otherwise kind and gentle, nurturing, etc. Has a temper, though, and immense destructive powers. Gets lost very easily, has a calming Wavelength and is paired with Stein for this reason. Has a crush on him, which was fulfilled in the manga.`

`Azusa Yumi:  
Female Death Scythe, Weapon form: crossbow with sniper rifle instead of arrow slot. Black hair in a bob, black suit, glasses, very strict. Original partner unknown, works with Sid on several occasions. Has "Thousand-Mile Eyes" or something similar, which allows her to see through allied eyes and construct detailed building layouts without stepping foot into them.`

`Tezca Tlipoca:  
Manga-only male Death Scythe, Weapon form: mirror. Wears a giant mascot-like bear mask all the time for unknown reasons. Has a monkey named Enrique for a partner. Seems earnest and understanding, tries to reason with Justin when he went darkside before trying to kill him.`

`Arachne Gorgon:  
Big titty Goth GF.`

I spared a moment to chuckle sheepishly and be _very_ thankful that Rex couldn't read Italian…even if what I wrote was the absolute truth.

`Spider Witch, founder of organization Arachnophobia. Black hair in a decorative, aristocratic bun, black eyes with spiderlike silver lines, long billowing black dress with detached sleeves ending in splayed spiderlike fabric "claws." Choker with a fuzzy back with eight splayed legs protruding from it, a span of spiderlike webbing connects choker to the neckline of her dress. Manipulative and subtly obsessive over the idea of becoming mother to all things, acts with kindness and affection towards her minions, which masks her cruel and selfish nature. Speaks in a very refined manner, frequently drinks wine.`

`Giriko:  
Male Weapon and Enchanter that works for Arachne. Weapon form: chainsaw. Brown hair that spikes in a variety of ways, including a quasi-mohawk, brown eyes, sharp teeth, lots of piercings. Huge gloves that all Enchanters have. Creator of the first golem ever, has been loyal to Arachne for over 800 years and has been pretending to be placid and calm all that time. (Survived by imprinting his memories/soul into his children.) Bloodthirsty, rude, crass, frequently drinking, loves to brawl, etc. Highly dangerous, implies several times that he is not afraid to rape his female opponents before killing them. AVOID.`

`Mosquito:  
Male Monster and Arachne's butler. Short old man in a black top hat and suit, with a grey mustache and cartoonishly long, pointed nose, which he can use like a mosquito's proboscis to drain people's blood. Loyal to Arachne body and soul, is capable of assuming his past forms, including his toughest (100 years ago), fastest (200 years), most numerous (400 years, and the only time he looks like a normal non-cartoonish person), and his original form, which is briefly hinted at before he is summarily killed.`

`"Eibon"/Noah:  
Manga-only male Sorcerer. Dark skin and hair, wears a plaid newsboy cap and has a white(?) shirt. He masquerades as Eibon for a while, but is actually an icon created by the Book of Eibon, more specifically the Index within it. Several Noahs are created over the course of the manga, each one specific to a Seven Deadly Sin. (Initially Greed, then Wrath. Other Noahs are then vomited out by Crona after consuming Noah, the Book, and Asura, but never take action in the series.)`

`Gopher:  
Manga-only male…something or other, created by Greed!Noah to serve as his servant. Species never specified, but has a Grigori soul and was augmented by magic in some way, according to Maka. Can use magic, may be a Sorcerer like Noah. Has black, slicked-back hair and an odd vest with gold(?) designs on it. Obsessively loyal to Noah, craves his approval and is devoted to him completely, no matter which Noah appears. Appears sadistic and has no problem tormenting others in his encounters with Maka and Kid.`

`Eibon:  
Great Old One of Knowledge, appears as a figure dressed in odd, ornate robes with a visor-like mask over his face. Viewed as the greatest Sorcerer of them all, Eibon is immensely intelligent, as befitting the Old One of Knowledge, and has a curious, scientific mind. However, Eibon also seems to possess a strong sense of ethics, refusing to continue the Weapon experimentation when he figured out its ultimate end, and assisting the DWMA at one point in both the anime and the manga. Similarly, like Lord Death, he seems to contain his god-like Wavelength to keep it from infecting nearby people with his particular brand of Madness, unlike Asura, Excalibur, and the Black Mass.`

`The Black Mass:  
Manga-only Great Old One of Knowledge, appears as a vaguely humanoid figure many times larger than a human, made of some type of viscous black substance, with white eyes and dripping tendrils forming its mouth and spindly arms. Infects people with its Madness to test them and their personality, as it gives them unhindered power at the cost of their sanity. It actually sealed itself into the Book of Eibon voluntarily to confine itself, as power would be the "eighth" deadly sin. Technically good/on the DWMA's side, but dangerously unpredictable.`

`Excalibur:  
A cartoonish male creature, all white, with a top hat and cane. Excalibur's ability to annoy people is legendary, which fits, as the manga heavily implies that he is the Great Old One of Rage. Excalibur is the first Weapon in the world, and the inspiration for Eibon's experiments, able to match Wavelengths with anyone, but as many characters find out over the course of the series, there are little to no people who can actually endures Excalibur's conceited, nonsensical personality. Excalibur does have moments of seriousness around Lord Death, however, especially during dire moments.`

`Asura:  
Great Old One of Fear, and more specifically Madness Through Fear. Wrapped in mummylike bandages/scarves made of his own skin, which occasionally wrap around his face, Asura has an eye motif: his symbol is three long, vertical eyes in a rough triangle, which is tattooed onto the backs of his hands, and the strands of his black hair actually look like eyes, with white streaks interrupted by black bars in their center. He also has a third eye in his forehead, and his pupils are slitted to resemble eyes themselves. All up with the eyes, this guy!`

`Passively emits a Madness Wavelength that causes other people to hallucinate and pulls them into insanity and corruption. Can use skin-scarves as weapons, and is strong enough to break bones with his bare hands. Uses multiple kinds of energy-based attacks, including regurgitating his former Weapon partner (whom he ate) to shoot lasers. Impossible to kill. Can also generate Clowns in the manga, which can serve as perpetually-regenerating foot soldiers as long as they are connected to his Wavelength –Clowns can also corrupt people themselves, with a Clown being responsible for Justin Law's eventual betrayal.`

I flicked through my pages with satisfaction –sure, it wasn't a whole lot when you thought of how much a lot of the characters did, going through the series and whatnot, but it had what counted. Namely, this pages-long list had power sets and a rough personality recap of all the characters I remembered, which would jog any memories loose if/when I encountered these people, and also tell me when and how fast to run when I did. For instance, if I came across Giriko, Medusa, or Asura, I'd take to my heels immediately, because they majorly outclassed me in terms of combat ability and ruthlessness. A fight with them would end up with me dead or worse inside of five minutes.

Munching absently on a breadstick Rex had passed over, I started a new list. This one would probably be a lot less reliable, and definitely not something I should treat as gospel in terms of order, but it was important to get as many plot details as I could remember down on paper.

`PLOT:`

`After Death Festival, start of main series. Main protagonists (Maka, Blackstar, Kid) are introduced. Maka fails on her 100th soul to collect a Witch, accidentally confronting Blair instead. (Blair survives due to all cats having nine souls.) Blackstar first meets Mifune and Angela, and passes over killing them and instantly turning Tsubaki into a Death Scythe. Kid confronts a Witch in Egypt, but has all his souls confiscated by his father after he destroys the pyramid in an OCD-based rage.`

`First proper arc. Maka and Soul are shown in school, discussing Sid's death. They get called up to the Death Room along with Blackstar and Tsubaki and are given a remedial lesson because they have all collectively failed to collect a single soul. They go to confront Sid, and then Stein after they beat him, prompting a concerned Kid to enroll in the school (as he couldn't interfere without being a student) after he watches Stein beat the tar out of them with his father. Kid, however, doesn't even make it out of the school, as he has another anxiety attack, and the entire event is revealed to be a trick by Sid and Stein, who pulled this whole stunt on Lord Death's orders. Maka and Soul learn to Resonate for the first time in this arc, and Maka unlocks her Soul Perception ability.`

`Second arc, Kid's introduction to the school. Blackstar and Soul split from their partners and try to partner with each other instead, while Blackstar also tries to confront Kid for allegedly taking his spotlight. Kid wipes the floor with both of them, and they return to their partners. Maka also practices her Soul Perception, trying to see Lord Death's soul out of curiosity when he comes to pick up Kid, but doesn't see anything, unaware of the fact that Lord Death's soul is so large that its diameter covers all of Death City.`

`Third arc, Crona's introduction. Maka and Soul first encounter him in a basilica in Italy, where he kills and devours a large gang of thugs. Stein and Spirit come rescue them when they get in over their heads, with Soul nearly being killed by Crona slicing his chest open when he lunges to protect Maka. They also encounter Medusa, who retrieves a comatose Crona after Stein Soul-Forces him into disharmony with Ragnarok and sends a cursory attack after the group, which Stein defeats easily. Maka begins to have an inferiority complex with Soul, who she views as stronger than her, and works to overcome him, which leads to a strained relationship and eventually an argument that makes it impossible for her to even wield him when they are confronted by a newly-freed Free in London. (Medusa freed him to experiment with how much the black blood mixed in Soul's wound would affect him.) This is also when Medusa forcibly recruits Eruka.`

`At some point in this, Tsubaki confronts and kills her brother, who was on the path to becoming a Kishin, and takes on his ability as the Uncanny Sword. This allows her to manipulate her meister's shadow: however, this comes at a cost, as the Uncanny Sword eats away at its wielder's soul unless they make peace with the embodiment of Tsubaki's clan, which looks like this deer…thing.`

`Fourth arc, DWMA anniversary. Kid encounters Crona on the ghost ship, the Nidhogg, and the Flying Dutchman's comments prior awaken a suspicion in Kid about his father and the Kishin "closer to him." After offscreen interrogation, Lord Death reveals the truth about Asura to Kid, which depresses him during the anniversary party. Medusa takes advantage of all the DWMA personnel being in one place to use Free and Eruka to lock the space in an Independent Cube, which even Lord Death cannot escape, and sends the Mizune sisters to cause death and destruction in the city. Sid, however, manages to get back from the investigation of Medusa's booby-trapped lab that Stein sent him on in time to drop Stein, Maka, Soul, Blackstar, Tsubaki, Kid, Liz, and Patty out of the Cube before it forms. This group then head beneath the school to stop Medusa, meeting up with Spirit, while Blair confronts the Mizune sisters in the city. Stein and Spirit confront Medusa, with Maka fighting Crona and Blackstar and Kid sent after Eruka and Free, who have a briefcase full of black blood, which when injected into the Kishin (currently sealed in a bag of his own skin) will awaken him. Kid and Blackstar are delayed by Free placing an illusion of himself much farther back then he and Eruka's progress, and though they manage to reach the duo and fight them, an illusion born of the Kishin's latent Madness stops Blackstar from slicing the correct syringe at a fatal moment, and Asura is resurrected, before blasting his way out and engaging in a fight with Lord Death over Death City. Asura escapes and Medusa is "killed" by Stein and Spirit, while the rest of her faction flees. Maka manages to reach Crona, who is taken into the DWMA on a trial basis.`

`Fifth arc, trial enrollment. Death Scythes Marie, Justin, and Azusa arrive in the city and personnel is reshuffled, with Spirit being assigned permanently to Lord Death (who probably would've won the fight with Asura if he had a Death Scythe) and Marie being assigned to Stein to counteract the negative affects a risen Asura's Madness Wavelength would have on him. Maka and the others help Crona adjust to being a DWMA student, including a mission to the Czech Republic when the oldest golem goes berserk, in which Giriko and Arachne are introduced and it is revealed that Arachne is Crona's aunt and Medusa's older sister. Maka is paralyzed by spiderwebs shooting out of the golem, but Crona protects her for long enough for Justin Law to arrive, as he confronts and fights Giriko on equal terms before Arachne orders Giriko to retreat while leaving the golem to death with them. It is destroyed by Justin, and Maka is returned to the DWMA, angering Blackstar with her condition. He goes to confront Arachnophobia and finds Mifune, who has been coerced into joining them by threats to Angela, the young Witch he's protecting. Blackstar is soundly beaten by Mifune, which shakes his confidence in himself.`

`At some point, Kid is pulled out of a party he organized for Crona and sent to retrieve the Eternal Spring from the Red-Hot Runaway Express in the Sahara Desert. He sees Eibon's name alongside his father's on the creation plate, disturbing him and making him question his trust in his father and what he's doing. When he goes to borrow the manuscript from the DWMA library (getting high-level clearance due to being Lord Death's son) he finds that the book is missing and only the letter M is left as a checkout name, possibly indicating Medusa. (It is later revealed to actually have been Maka, in the manga.) `

`After said party, Medusa (who split her soul into multiple pieces, then reassembled them with the enormous energy released by the Kishin's resurrection), who is now possessing the body of a prepubescent girl, starts manipulating Crona into spying on the DWMA for her, using him to plant a snake in Marie's tea, which will amplify instead of calm Stein's Madness and also act as a magical bug for Medusa.`

`Sixth arc, chain resonance. The EAT class is taught to extend their Resonance to a team of two other meisters and their Weapons, something that Maka, Kid, and Blackstar all struggle with. After a remedial lesson from Stein, however, they succeed, just in time for the BREW mission to kick off. Arachnophobia and the DWMA clash over the demon tool BREW, the Tempest, created by the Sorcerer Eibon and currently in the middle of a vast magnetic field on an island north of Alaska. Stein and Marie attempt to Resonate after entering said magnetic field, but the snake Medusa planted inside Marie quickly drives Stein to the brink, with Marie unable to retrieve BREW. Maka and her team then enter the magnetic field proper and confront Mosquito with their first combative Chain Resonance, while Kilik, Ox, and Kim fight Arachnophobia forces outside said magnetic field. Arachnophobia retrieve BREW, but later find it powerless, which is actually because Medusa sent the Mizune sisters in early to retrieve it and plant a copy.`

`CANON BETWEEN ANIME AND MANGA BEGINS TO DIVERGE AT THIS POINT.`

`Anime:  
Joe Buttataki is summoned to create new technology based on Eibon's demon tools that the DWMA has discovered. Kid begins to investigate Eibon and his ties to Lord Death, while Blackstar, frustrated over his recent losses, challenges Kid to a fight, which Blackstar loses horribly, but then uses to regain his confidence afterwards. Medusa also pressures Crona into running away from the DWMA (thankfully Maka recovers him once again), as well as cutting a deal that involves her giving up BREW and Asura's location, which is at Arachne's castle. A big battle with Arachnophobia occurs, in which Lord Death uses BREW to mobilize Death City as a fighting robot and Maka and Soul temporarily leave the engagement to help Marie and Crona find and kill Medusa once and for all, as she has corrupted/kidnapped Stein. Lord Death manages to recapture Asura, and the two fight, with Asura using Lord Death's desire to protect the others to land a near-critical hit before fleeing back to Arachne's castle and killing her. Maka, Blackstar, and Kid all then confront, fight, and defeat Asura.`

`Manga:  
Joe Buttataki is summoned to investigate the possibility of a mole within the DWMA. Joe has the strongest Soul Perception in the series, and is said to be one of the first meister who might be able to break through a Witch's Soul Protect with it. This, incidentally, is why he broke off a relationship with Marie, as he feared his Soul Perception would grow so strong that he would be able to read her every thought. They try to rekindle their romance, but en route to the restaurant Marie is waiting at, Joe unfortunately unlocks his fullest Soul Perception, detecting several Witches in the city, and is then murdered as Medusa looks on. Suspicion is put on Stein, who is actually almost arrested over it, with him being saved only by Spirit letting him go to find the real murderer with Marie. Crona is also abducted/forced to leave by Medusa, but remains antagonistic to the DWMA until the end of the series due to what is heavily implied to be brainwashing mixed with more of her manipulation. Blackstar fights and is defeated by Kid, but then goes on a sabbatical with Tsubaki to her family in Japan to learn how to properly use the Uncanny Sword. Maka discovers the first Clown on a mission in Russia with Blair and Kid, which tries to sink her into Madness, but fails, as she discovers her Demon-Hunter attack, which is more powerful than the usual Witch-Hunter and channels her anti-demon Wavelength to great effect. Medusa also tips the DWMA off to several innocent Witches living in the city, including Kim Diehl, who flees the city due to a mishandled confrontation. Medusa then uses the favor of said tip to manipulate the DWMA into attacking Arachne's castle with her, showcasing Blackstar's new abilities upon his return as he kills Mifune in armed combat, as well as reuniting Ox and Kilik with Kim, who were manipulated into joining Arachnophobia and then brainwashed into staying there. Kid is captured by the Sorcerer Noah, barely managing to fling Liz and Patty to safety in time as he is sucked into the Book of Eibon. Arachne drops her body entirely to become one with Madness, but Soul and Maka kill her anyways, and Medusa possesses Arachne's body, once more looking like her adult self, except with her sister's black hair. She is driven away by the timely arrival of Tezca and his partner. After the battle, a disoriented Giriko (who was drugged by Liz and Patty during infiltration) wanders the halls, before he is confronted by a traitorous Justin Law, who brings him over to Noah's group, with Justin being later confronted by Stein and Marie in the desert near Death City. The Spartoi unit is formed, consisting of Maka, Soul, Blackstar, Tsubaki, Kid (later), Liz, and Patty, as well as Kilik, Ox, and Kim and their Weapon partners. Maka turns Soul into a Death Scythe with Arachne's soul, then harnesses her Grigori soul with Soul's new abilities to create wings out of his scythe, enabling her to fly. During a practice run of this, she is confronted by Gopher, who accidentally reveals Noah's name during their ensuing fight. Kilik investigates one of Medusa's labs in Africa, alongside Liz and Patty, and Blackstar and Tsubaki discover another of her lairs, fighting a decidedly more unhinged Crona. Spartoi then gears up to enter the Book of Eibon and rescue Kid, going through seven chapters that reflect the Seven Deadly Sins before Blackstar enters the Power chapter and fights an insanity-enhanced Kid. Spartoi is then ejected from the Book, and manage to kill Noah, but Gopher escapes with the Book of Eibon. Tezca manages to track Justin down, but is killed in a final confrontation, though his soul manages to retreat back to Death City to reside in a mirror. Crona then resurfaces in Russia, killing the Death Scythe there by subsuming him and his partner in spheres made of his black blood, which radiate more Madness of their own. Crona also destroys an entire town in Ukraine with this same ability: for this, he is put on the Death List. Medusa later drives him to kill her and sever his last idea of "order," which fully pushes Crona off the edge into insanity. Maka, searching for Crona, later discovers that Asura is on the Moon, and preparations go forward to confront him and the Clown army there. The battle is bloody and ultimately futile due to the endless regeneration of the Clowns, and Kid is eventually called back down to Earth to negotiate a treaty with the Witches. He manages this, and the Clowns are defeated and killed alongside Justin Law: however, Crona has entered the Moon's nasal passages and already consumed Asura, as well as defeating Noah and Gopher. The ensuing tide of Madness causes the Witches to teleport everyone back down to Earth, accidentally dragging Kid with them: eventually, he, Maka, and Blackstar confront Crona, who drives their Wavelengths out of sync until Maka manages to Resonate with her father, stating that family is a bond that cannot be severed. Remembering what he did to Medusa, Crona snaps, and Asura subsumes him, fighting with the trio as Maka reclaims Soul and eventually manages to use his piano skills and the influence of the black blood to enter into Asura and find Crona. Crona uses BREW to lock Asura away on the Moon, ushering in a new age of peace and cooperation.`

I surveyed my two lists with a frown. The manga was longer than the anime –darker, too. More people died or were corrupted past salvation…I didn't like it.

Not like that mattered, though. If this was the mangaverse, I was just gonna have to suck it up and endure, and maybe also start frantic plots on how I could lock the Kishin away _without_ Crona being sentenced to be the eternal lock on his prison. Crona was a good kid, in his/her/their way, and he'd basically been kicked around by his mother and fate for his entire life, and just when he'd gotten a glimpse of a good life, she'd ruthlessly snatched it away from him. If this was the anime verse, I wouldn't have to do much of anything, really, but…well…

If I wanted to save Crona in the mangaverse, I'd have to out-plot fucking _Medusa_.

No pressure.

"Hey, Rex." I said between absent-minded bites at the snack platter he had fetched earlier, and we were demolishing between us. "How would you outsmart a Witch?"

He blinked at me as I looked up from my notepad for the first time in over an hour.

"A Witch?"

"Yup." I nodded. "I mean, we'll have to do it eventually, right?"

Rex pursed his lips thoughtfully and nibbled at a chip to buy himself time.

"Don't be predictable." he said eventually, making me blink in turn. "Witches live way longer than we do, right? That means they have more experience, so…don't do something that they would have experience with."

I hummed thoughtfully. "Not bad, not bad at all…" I said, somewhat impressed. That was surprisingly practical information from a guy who had probably never run across a Witch in his life.

Rex flushed happily.

"Still though," I said, crossing one leg over the other and leaning back with a frustrated frown. "How the heck would we be unpredictable to someone who's lived for hundreds of years? Like they've got to have experience with just about everything that we, as DWMA students, would think to throw at them, right?"

Rex sighed and rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "Well, there's a reason that only EAT students are allowed to go after Witches." he admitted. "And only _after_ they collect the 99 other souls. Countless teams have lost their lives when they challenged a Witch."

I echoed his previous sigh, exhaling mournfully as I slumped even further back in my chair. Sure, I wasn't planning on challenging Medusa directly in a fight (despite how satisfying it would be to part her head from her shoulders), but that didn't change the fact that she could probably run rings around me, scheming-wise.

Heck, who was I kidding. She would _cream_ me, as far as scheming went. She'd been the one to betray Arachne to the DWMA during her near-death, which meant Medusa was _at least_ 800 years old, and been evil and plotting the entire time.

Still…planning for a contingency for Crona's betrayal specifically wouldn't even put me on her radar, as long as I was excruciatingly careful not to arouse any kind of suspicion by enacting anything before the last second. It was risky, but in theory, if I had a solid strategy that I could pull at the very last second, with little to no prep work, I'd be able to enact it flawlessly, because Medusa wouldn't have time to counter-plot. That in itself would be problematic, as she almost certainly had backup plans in place, but in theory, if I dug deep enough, I'd eventually come to a point that she didn't plan for, especially if she hadn't anticipated trouble in that direction. Oh, sure, she probably had two or three contingencies for _everything_ , but there were moments when she didn't expect opposition, and thus there would probably _only_ be those two or three contingencies for that particular element in her plan.

And what a delightful moment for me that might be, being able to honestly say that I had out-schemed the greatest schemer of them all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: November 16th, 2020, 7.04 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: November 16th, 2020, 6.11 PM USA Central Time


	7. Introductory Course A

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The same dude from last time drew another piece recently, and someone else set an image of Arya as their profile pic. Slowly but surely, I am gaining fanart for this series...who knows, I might actually draw some myself at some point. 
> 
> Link: https://iliveonmylaptop.tumblr.com/post/637522605866401792/me-rereading-the-transfer-for-like-the-fourth
> 
> Also, apologies for anyone who wants to see, like, the actual canon characters, but they're almost all unanimously in EAT and Arya's in NOT, so that's gonna take. Um. A bit. I'm so sorry, she's not hogging the limelight I promise, it's just unrealistic for the main characters to pop up in a different class for like. No fucking reason.

_Arya's POV:_

It was approximately 6.00 in the morning, with the sun already shining and laughing brightly over the desert floor and the city rising like a mountain above it. Enormous candles burned in their places within the DWMA exterior, and at the bottom of the white steps leading up to the school bolted a blonde teenager and her black-haired partner, recently-purchased bookbags flapping and bouncing at their hips and the blonde with a slice of toast in her mouth.

"Arya, seriously!" Rex panted behind me as we bounded up the steps. "You could've eaten that at any time on the bus ride to the school!"

"Hits fah fradifion!" I called back, chewing rapidly on the toast. "Nehxt hi hotta he late!"

"What?! You can't be late on _purpose_!" Rex cried. "You're a new student! You'll get in trouble!"

"Hits fah fradifion!" I repeated stubbornly, before managing to gulp down the last of my toast. "I gotta be late for anime school!"

_"What!?"_

Of course, neither of us could sustain this pace of bounding up the steps forever, and we slowed to a sort of skipping uphill jog as we cleared the normal skyline of the city, passing some of the slower and sleepier NOT students on our way. Rex, as I had noticed before, was surprisingly fit for being such a skinny dweeb, and moreover had been walking these steps for years, so he very possibly equaled EAT students in how fast he could climb them. As for myself, I'd been going through a quasi-combative training regimen for almost an entire year, which meant I was way ahead of the middle-school NOT students who were only just now getting into the _idea_ of being at a combat school, and might very well not be attending the academy for the purposes of combat.

Anyways, one of my plans to better gel my transition into this school was playing to anime tropes. Hence, the run-to-school-late-with-toast-in-my-mouth, which would hopefully align the gears of this world in such a way as to make me seem normal, to make my attendance at this school have something of routine. It couldn't hurt, right?

A weekend full of signing up for after-school combat classes had left me a bit squirrely, especially when I remembered the level that Maka and the other EAT students had fought at, which had full-fledged anime acrobatics and other feats that I wasn't sure I was physically capable of mimicking, even after my near-year of semi-combative training and practice and current place within this world. I wasn't a native-born anime person. I couldn't do the bendy-bendy.

Eh. I had a buster sword for a partner. Agility didn't really need to be our MO.

In any case, after two days of hearing statistics and watching improbable feats of agility and strength from practicing teams, I was impressed with a sense of my own inexperience and mortality. I wanted to grease the wheels of the system, do anything I could to make things easier for me that I could. Playing to anime tropes was an easy and hopefully harmless way to do that. I didn't want to accidentally slot myself into a protagonist role, after all, since "unaware protagonist" was a common trope of harems _and_ isekai stories, and this was a pervy anime to begin with. I needed to watch my step, lest I inadvertently plunge my foot into the messy pool of human entanglements that was harem shenanigans.

And since that also meant I would be actually living the embodiment of a fanfic, I was staying as _far_ away from such a scenario as I possibly could. Fanfic logic shouldn't mesh with real-world logic, inasmuch as the world I was in was "real."

One should be able to notice when one was drooling out of their mouth, after all.

Anyways, I flicked my schedule out of my satchel for one last quick read-through as Rex and I jogged up the steps. It seemed like we'd start off with gym after morning check-in, which made sense, since Death City _was_ in a desert and they probably wanted to get exercise out of the way as early or as late in the day as possible, either before the sun started to bake the ground or when it was setting and the arid air lost pretty much all of its daytime heat. Since official school let out sometime in the early afternoon, starting gym first thing in the morning was really our only feasible option. Today was a Day A schedule, too, which meant that I stayed later than Rex for Meister Studies.

More to the point, though, what with all the extra combat classes (well, combat preparation, but that was splitting hairs), I didn't really have… _time_ to do all the meta research I wanted. My day was eaten up by school, and given the amount of physical activity _in_ said school day, I'd probably be exhausted by the end of it. Forget about researching the general stuff outside of whatever studies Britain was doing, I'd probably be lucky to even get to the library.

I made a rueful face as I popped open a folder from my satchel and replaced the schedule sheet. Hooking up with the school might not have been my best plan…but then again, sometimes you just couldn't have a "best" plan. You could choose between better and worse, with the better (in my case) being a part of the dominant and ethical world organization, and the worse being an underling to someone who would at best case be ready to betray me at any second, and at worst case have intolerable fellow workers to deal with.

I remembered the Baba Yaga Castle infiltration mission in the manga. A disguised Maka had been assigned to clean Giriko's room (which apparently needed cleaning every half hour) and after refusing his arbitrary order to take off her mask when he realized she was a woman, Giriko had threatened to chop off her mask with her head still in it.

Working with that sort of person? No _fucking_ thank you.

As Rex and I climbed the steps, I absently wondered why the hell I was more leery of Giriko than I was of his boss Arachne, since Arachne was exponentially more powerful (in intelligence, experience, _and_ raw force) than either of us and could reduce me _or_ Giriko to a bloody smear on the floor within seconds. Then again, that might actually be it –there was a teeny, tiny, pinprick-sized chance that even now, unused to being partnered with Rex, I had the reflexes and combat ability to at least survive and run away from Giriko, whereas with Arachne I was dead seventeen-thousand ways from Sunday no matter what I did.

There was a certain calm in accepting inevitability. It was like standing next to an about-to-detonate bomb with a mile-wide radius. There was no way in hell that I would survive, regardless of what I did, so why bother panicking or worrying about it?

That was the sort of feeling I got with Medusa and Arachne and Asura. They were _so_ many leagues above me, in so many ways, that it was pretty much pointless to think that I'd survive a combative or competitive scenario with them, at least right now. It just wasn't going to happen. They outclassed me in the terms of counterintelligence, of raw combative power, of skill, of experience, of fucking _everything_.

Giriko, on the other hand, or Mosquito, or Mifune, or even Justin Law post-betrayal, I had (at least in theory) a _chance_ of surviving and/or running away from them, which automatically ratcheted up the fear factor by an intensity of thousands. Giriko was a berserker and could thus be outsmarted, Mosquito was fanatically loyal to Arachne and could thus be distracted, Mifune never killed anyone unless he had to, and Justin had a one-track mind both pre and post Madness and could thus be just plain avoided. Sure, they outclassed me in multiple areas, but they all, in theory, had weaknesses I would be able to exploit. Arachne and the other top-level bad guys didn't have weaknesses as such, or if they did, they weren't things I could take advantage of.

That, amongst many other things, was why I was jogging up the stairs with Rex today. With his help over these next few semesters, I would hopefully get the learning and practice to turn myself into a full-fledged anime _badass_. Then I would be able to stand firmly toe-to-toe with some of the scariest motherfuckers to ever darken the doors of this world, and not have shivers of fear at the very idea. The idea had me grinning. I mean, okay, so maybe it was a bit geeky of me, but who _wouldn't_ be excited about becoming the awesome kind of hero you saw in anime all the time?!

This was _totally_ not related to my lowkey constant overwhelming fear of Oliver hunting me down across dimensions and ripping me apart. Yup.

Eh, anyways. The school psychologist said that I should only start worrying when I began to develop abnormal reactions to things, and being scared of an immortal who swore eternal vengeance upon you seemed perfectly normal to me. Getting proper combat training and experience would hopefully help, giving me the illusion that I'd be able to at least fight him off, should he ever come knocking again. And I mean, how much of an illusion would it be? I'd managed to thwart his plans when I was a gawky 16-year-old that had sort of tripped headfirst into the right solutions. I was almost 18 now, with what was almost a full year of experience and practice in _not dying_ in a variety of very lethal situations, up to and including a lowkey zombie apocalypse. One guy, however diabolical and undying, was probably much less of a threat.

Probably.

I winced and rubbed my thumb over the fingernails of one hand. They were back at normal length again…finally. Hopefully, my combative training at the school would keep a painful nail-ripping from ever happening to me a second time. Hopefully, I wouldn't have to undergo any kind of torture like that ever again. Hopefully, my time at the DWMA would make me strong enough to prevent it.

This much unfounded hope wasn't my usual jam, so Rex was able to yank me into our homeroom classroom –apparently the 11th of the NOT classrooms– before I realized where we were in the winding mass of corridors. I might have to devote some of my incremental leisure time to wandering around the school with a map in hopes of fixing locations in my head…

The room was just like the EAT classroom shown in most of the series –a lecture hall with white and black checkered tile floor, tiers of conjoined desks and seats, two-step dais and teacher's podium on the center of the floor, blackboard behind it, wall sconces with candles, and circular windows looking out at the achingly bright desert sky. I felt myself relax a little, even though I was a bit peeved at Rex for ruining my anime-esque first day. This was a familiar setting even before last week: I'd seen this classroom, or one just like it, dozens of times over the course of the _Soul Eater_ series. This was familiar, predictable, safe.

This was going to be my life for the next few months, apparently.

"So like, do we have assigned seats?" I asked, looking over at Rex, who was apparently relieved that I hadn't made myself late.

"Ah, uh, not really." he flustered, apparently caught off guard by my sudden question. "I mean, I have one that _I_ have –this is the classroom I've been at for a while- so like I have a seat that I'm at, but they're not assigned-"

One of the things that I had rapidly discovered about Rex was the fact that when he felt on edge during a conversation, he tended to babble frantically, hopping from excuse to excuse under the logic that one of them had to stick eventually. It was somewhat endearing, in a "puppy falling flat on its face" sort of way.

I had also figured out pretty quickly that you needed to head Rex off before he gathered steam and just straight-up started bringing in anything and everything under the sun into his apologetic speech –my morbid curiosity during one such conversation had led to him eventually apologizing for the weather, the local harvest, the economy, and capitalism. I half-wondered if the reason he was so jumpy around partners was the fact that he was some kind of shrimpy elder god in disguise, and the whole faculty were worried about a potential partner blowing his cover.

_"Behold for it is I, King of the Tempest, Lord of All Worlds! Tremble abject at my feet, pathetic mortals, for your world shall soon come to an end under my-"_

Nope.

Not possible.

Not even a little.

He might dress a little edgy, but Rex was in no way even subtly cool enough to be an apocalyptic being in disguise. I knew the tropes, I knew what to look for, and even though I was now technically "in" the story, I could still see the patterns happening immediately around me. Rex's place in the classroom seemed to skew towards the "loner people might pick on/gossip about" end of the curve, which was going to change pretty damn rapidly if I had anything to say about it.

"So where's your seat?" I asked, cutting off his tirade.

"Oh, um-" Rex pointed, and before he could start apologizing again I grabbed his shoulders and steered him to it with gentle but implacable force.

"I can sit next to you, right?"

"W-well, yeah…"

Rex sat down on first aisle seat of the first row and I sat next to him on the second seat in, dropping our bookbags on the ground under the overhang of the desk. The satchels had been something the school offered during our trial week, and at this point in my life I was far past the point of refusing free stuff. It had proven to be a good extra bag to cart around my day-to-day stuff, like notebooks and folders and a pencil case for the school, and potentially my grimoire/journal and magic supplies in the future. The bookbag was a plain brown satchel just like all the others in every anime ever, but the buckle on the front was, of course, a silver Lord Death skull.

_I swear the branding is worse than Disney's at this point._

The class already had some other students –not a lot, maybe a little less than half the class. Most of them were scattered in the tiers above us, and I gave Rex a sidelong look.

"So, uh, any reason we're front row center?" I asked him, tapping a single finger on the desk we were sat behind. The aisle seat (since there weren't any windows except behind the whole class) was a bit of a risky position, non-protagonist wise, though from my memory Maka and Soul were usually actually in the center of a row.

Rex blinked at me, apparently surprised by the question.

"It's the best place to learn." he said. "And since I keep coming back every year-"

He stopped and flushed, looking away to stare at the desk. I could fill in the blanks.

_Since he keeps cycling through this class, he has first pick of the seats before anyone else gets here._

"Well, at least we've got the best seats in the house." I said pointedly, leaning back and folding my arms behind my head as I took on an exaggeratedly comfortable position, trying to nonverbally indicate that I was totally fine with this.

A hiss of sound caught my ears, and my gaze twitched to the side. Some of the students settling around the room were giggling quietly to themselves, glancing over at us and then looking away. My eyes narrowed at them, and at _last_ , for the first time in over a week, I managed to catch one of the gossipers in the act of looking at us, locking eye contact with him before he could look away. It was someone I didn't recognize –some background nobody from the series, probably.

He _smirked_ at me, and looked away, saying something to what I presumed to be his partner.

"So, is there any particular reason everybody's giving me/us weird looks all the time?" I asked, glancing over at Rex again as he set up his pencils and zippered case.

He jumped so badly he knocked his pencils off the side of the desk. The clatter had everyone glancing over at us for a second, and Rex quickly bent his head to pick them up, one arm bracing himself on the desk. I waited it out until he sat up again, and gave him a wordless look, raising one eyebrow.

"N-no. Not really." Rex stammered in what had to be the worst lie I had ever witnessed in my entire life.

I raised the other eyebrow.

Rex squirmed in his seat.

" _Rex_ -"

"HI PROFESSOR SID!" Rex blurted loudly as Sid stepped into the room, clutching the desk with white-knuckled fingers. Sid looked over at us and raised an eyebrow of his own, before shrugging and stepping over to the podium.

"Morning, class. For those of you that are new NOT students, welcome to your first class –we're gonna kill it today. For everyone else, welcome back. Today we will…"

Rex eased out of his white-knuckled fear when I didn't keep nudging him under the cover of Sid's introductory speech as he laid out what we would be doing today and took attendance, but Rex's skating around his prior partner issues was rapidly graduating from a concern to something alarming. He didn't seem _quite_ jumpy enough for it to be an issue of past trauma or an abusive partner…but if that was the case, then what the hell would make him so determined to avoid the subject?!

I was gonna drag it out of him eventually. We were partners.

I wasn't going to go to anyone else, either, since the gossip mill was hardly a good place to gather information and given anime school tropes, there was an exceedingly high chance that I would pull myself into a bully's shenanigans or have Rex overhear me asking around at exactly the worst time possible. Or both. Blackmail _and_ miscommunication, a key developing factor in a lot of school drama. Whoo-hoo-hoo.

That was probably going to be a major source of irritation for the next few months of my life.

Stupid anime tropes.

Stupid anime.

Stupid spell.

Stupid world.

_***Time Skip***_

I adamantly refused the stupid weird swimsuit bottoms the school provided for our gym uniforms. There was no earthly reason why I needed to wear a tight quasi-speedo and nothing else for the bottom half of my uniform –and if there was, I had men's swimshorts.

_Fucking **suck** it, you pervy anime._

In any case, wearing a white T-shirt with blue shoulders, the ubiquitous Lord Death skull on my left breast and NOT written underneath it, I was standing with all the other NOT students, ready for any exercise Naigus was going to throw at us. I wasn't the only one who had subtly rebelled against the Japanese-skewed exercise uniforms –since I remembered that this whole swimsuit thing was pretty omnipresent in school anime– and I was interested to note that even with this fairly basic uniform, there was a fair amount of customization. Some of what I presumed to be older students had patches or buttons in discreet places on their uniforms, or some extra embroidery, or baseball hats, or rolled-up and sometimes even torn-off sleeves, to say nothing of the pants, shorts, short-shorts, and in several cases skirts that some kids had claimed.

I made a mental note to stay away from the ones in skirts, since they would probably be either doing high-jumps or standing near convenient updrafts, though I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that some of the skirt-wearers were guys, or at least masculine-looking, and no one was giving them crap for it. In fact, nobody was even glancing at them more than a few times. Clearly, the DWMA did more than put its money where its mouth was as far as diversity and acceptance went. This was a nice change from the public schools I was used to.

Still, I had to admit that the exercise program was good, as far as my limited experienced went. After all, I had inadvertently ditched the whole educational life two out of four years into my high school, and my exercise ever since had been decidedly _extracurricular_ , even if it had also been, in many cases, much more severe. Nothing like intense, life-threatening pressure to make you train your body a lot, after all.

Since the NOT class had an as-yet-unknown percentage of kids who were at the DWMA for political rather than combative reasons, our gym class was less intensive than I would've thought. Sure, it was a level or two above normal gym, with a focus on running and agility, but I figured that that meant they wanted to train even the noncombative students to be able to dodge and duck and run away, should the worst occur and they be targeted by a Kishin Egg or a Witch. They relied on the extracurricular lessons to teach students how to hack and bash and all the rest of it: this was to keep us nimble and in shape.

Despite the implied difficulty of wielding a buster sword as my partner, I was more than eager to get into the agility exercises. The way I saw it, even though Rex's mass and shape would drag me down in any confrontation we had, skimping out on my mobility would leave me in the metaphorical position of a tank, which was something that I, with my tendency to run away from any direct life-threatening situation, was ill suited for. Maybe being a little fast on my feet wasn't a lot, but it was sure as shit better than _nothing_.

And besides, who knew? Once we got this whole partnership thing in the bag, Rex would be super light in my hands and I could presumably move a heck of a lot faster, disregarding any air resistance from his large flat blade. Maybe I _could_ be fast and have an impractically large weapon at the same time.

That was a discussion for the future, though. For now, I was content to run and jump and weave with the rest of the group, keeping an eye out for Rex when I had the breath and noticing that he was solidly in the middle of the pack, whereas I was slightly ahead, though still only in the upper middle. That fit –from what I remembered, Weapons weren't exactly intended for athleticism, though whether that was social or physical constraints I had no idea. Tsubaki could mimic Blackstar during a fight, and could clearly fight on her own as shown by the sequence between her and her brother, but Soul –despite attacking several opponents over the course of the series by using his arm transformed into the blade of his scythe– had never gotten a win to my memory. When fighting solo against Kid after a failed (temporary) partnership with Blackstar, he'd gotten his ass kicked. When he and Maka had been in the middle of an intense argument during their fight with Free, he had attacked and actually impaled Free right through the heart, but Free was immortal and had just plain ignored it. In the manga, when Maka was overcome by the Sloth chapter, Soul had attempted to fight Giriko on his own, and been thoroughly thrashed.

Granted, Liz and Patty switched out between each other and fought freely on their own, but they'd grown up as hoodlums on the streets of Brooklyn and had acted as each other's meisters for a long time before they'd met Kid. None of the others –not Jacklyn, not Fire or Thunder, not Harvar, not Tsugumi, _nobody_ – really solo fought, except as a last-ditch effort when their meister was incapacitated. Given as most of the Death Scythes could fight on their own, to my memory, it might be an ability thing, it might be an experience thing, it might be a physical thing, or a combination of all three. When Sid had portal-ed the main cast to safety by opening coffin-shaped chutes under their feet at the anniversary party, all the meisters had landed on their feet, whereas all the Weapons had landed on their collective asses, which was a point to it being some weird genetic thing, rather than an ability most Weapons just neglected due to circumstance.

Eh. Maybe I was looking into it too much –sometimes Weapons trained to fight on their own, sometimes they didn't, and the limitations of their Weapon form and body probably indicated how good they would be at it when/if they tried. Rex could partially transform, using parts of his arm as a blade much like how Soul did, but Rex also didn't look like he was supremely athletic in any way, which meant that even with lightweight physics-cheating Weapon powers, he couldn't slug it out for any length of time. For a Weapon, physically fighting on their own –even partially transformed– was probably a lot like fisticuffs, and some people just didn't have the endurance for that.

Rex didn't, and to be honest I probably didn't either, at least as far as throwing punches and kicks and whatnot went –I'd learned to fight properly with weapons, not martial arts. If we got separated during a fight, we were probably screwed, due to the fact that I couldn't start throwing off magic and whatnot and I probably wouldn't be able to reach any guns or knives I was carrying in time to defend myself.

I made a mental note never to get separated from Rex during a combat scenario.

Or learn martial arts.

Or both.

Both sounded like good options.

In any case, the psychical education part of the morning went by pretty easily, and we went for a quick scrubdown in the school shower rooms, something that I was still a bit leery about, but far better an accidental flash to my fellow female students or a crowded bump somewhere salacious than marinating in the fumes of my own sweat all day.

Wet hair pinned up and wearing my shirt, shorts and jacket, I trotted out to meet up with Rex and follow him back to our classroom. The history course was something I was interested in, especially since I only knew the broad strokes of a very specific period in time –now, and 800 years before now. I knew nothing before, and very little in between, and even the specifics of _what_ I knew would vary depending on whether this was the anime or the manga world. There was no way to tell that, either, not so far as I knew.

Unlike _Black Butler_ , wherein there were characters and canon divergence very early on –the earliest I could think of was Lau's radically different behavior in the Curry Arc, and Miss Nina's existence– _Soul Eater_ had almost identical characters and plotlines until almost halfway through the series. The earliest marked difference I knew started after the mission to rescue BREW, one of Eibon's creations on the Lost Island north of Alaska. That was weeks and weeks –no, _months_ ahead. The DWMA anniversary, in which Asura was resurrected, happened sometime during either the first of April or the first of May, and it was just now the first week of September.

Subtly tapping my fingers on the desk to count it out as I listened to the lecture, that was eight months _at least_ before I'd be able to tell which way this was all supposed to go. Sure, that'd give me a lot of wiggle room to plan for the manga route, should things go that way, but all the same…that was a heck of a lot of time. I wasn't sure that laying my plans out for the manga route, which was definitely the worser of the two timelines, would affect things badly should they turn out like the anime. Like, if I subtly installed some kind of memory-trigger in Crona so I could hopefully snap him out of it when he went full darkside, would that have a bad effect if he _didn't_ go darkside? Would it make him hesitate at a crucial second if/when he decided to return to the DWMA as per the anime timeline?

I should probably stop worrying about future events and start focusing on the lessons. Catching me out on my complete lack of historical knowledge was one of the few surefire ways that just about anybody would be able to reveal my sketchy doings –and by sketchy, I meant just-plain-weird and highly suspicious. I mean, who wouldn't know basic historical facts? Somebody who had been raised far out of normal society, that's who. Who would be raised far out of normal society? Aside from a dimension-hopping confused teenager –which was probably the last explanation anyone would think of– the only reasonable alternative was someone who lived in a society of their own, separate from the rest of normal society.

Someone like, say, a Witch.

The way my life and experiences were matching up so perfectly to the expected profile of a Witch was starting to become somewhat alarming. Was I conforming already? Was I merging with the laws of this reality?!

Rex noticed my stiffened posture about halfway through a section on how the education of history was divvied up and gave me a concerned poke with his foot, glancing sideways. I offered him a tight smile, and he shrugged, looking back to the board as the instructor chalked out the difference between _Prehistory to Renaissance_ and _Renaissance & After_. After all, what could be traumatic about history, or the learning thereof? Everybody had their quirks, but surely that couldn't be one of mine.

Eh. I had a phobia of poodles and cupcakes, both built upon horrific trauma. Rex didn't know everything yet.

Neither did I, though, and I glumly resigned myself to picking up yet more books at one of the local libraries to fill in the gaps of this lecture. Granted, this was the first day, so it was mostly taken up with the why and how of the class, but I was still going to need to pick up stuff fast if I wanted to approach "normal" history-knowing levels, never mind pass the course. I'd…actually probably have to do that for all my classes, and a gloom cloud briefly swirled around me as Rex jumped and flinched sideways in his seat.

For a brief second –just a brief second– I considered ditching the DWMA and working for someone, _anyone_ else.

__

_***Time Skip***_

I was interested to note that while History and Social Studies were essentially the same class in my memory, the DWMA outlined the clear divisions: whereas History was, well, what it said on the tin, that being the study of past events, Social Studies was broader in scope and dealt more with politics and how people thought, acted, and formed governments within a society, and how societies worked in the first place. Given as the DWMA was an international school, understanding of multiple world governments was automatically high up on the ranking sheet, and combine that with the fact that we –or at least the EAT class– were essentially worldwide mercenaries, well…learning how governments and societies and cultures worked and interplayed was important, to say the least.

Sid had touched on this earlier, but if Rex and I aimed to be in the EAT class, we were going to have to become…rather cosmopolitan. In theory, a DWMA student sent out to hunt Kishin Eggs would know how to conduct themselves in any cultural environment or social group across the entire world, potentially to the point of being undetectable, but probably more usually to just not offend anyone and everyone within hearing range. Pissing off the people we were sent to help had a range of bad consequences, which started in the area of in-the-moment inconvenience and ended in the domain of mass political uproar and fatalities.

I wondered if Lord Death ever had to send a waiver out to anyone that Blackstar took a mission for. _"We do not accept responsibility for damages, insults, fines, or catastrophes adjacent to this particular team's work. If any are suffered, please see the DWMA legal term for recompense. We're so sorry for whatever he's done now."_

In any case, though I vaguely remembered Social Studies being a heck of a lot more boring back home, as with all things at the DWMA, this was a highly and in fact desperately practical class. People weren't here because it was a school: they were here for what was essentially one of three reasons. One, amass political clout. Two, become a fighter defending humanity from Kishin Eggs. Three, make obscene amounts of profit off of the two prior methods or the merit of being a DWMA graduate. The DWMA, of course, was geared entirely towards the first two paths, which meant that any class that studied how people thought or how societies worked was going to be given heavy practical focus. This wasn't the typical "learn-the-civil-war-nine-times-in-nine-years" American shtick, this was preparing politicians and what could technically be argued child soldiers for the front lines.

I wasn't really comfortable with term, as any sane person would be, but by dictionary definition, even though no one at the DWMA had been _forced_ to attend, everyone aiming for or already in the EAT class was, by virtue of age, child soldiers. Maka was thirteen, I think, at the beginning of the series, or somewhere thereabouts, and she had already fought in 99 lethal combat scenarios and was aiming for 100. I didn't know how old Fire and Thunder were, but the both of them were probably under ten, and even though they were outliers to the best of my memory –and Weapons, who weren't directly exposed to harm in combat– the fact remained that they still put themselves in deadly dangerous scenarios multiple times over the course of the series alongside their partner.

The DWMA didn't seem to have any kind of age restrictions, but even so, it was a little odd that none of the students were, well, adults. I chalked that up to the fact that the relevant gene probably manifested in Weapons around puberty, at which point they obviously wasted no time in rushing to the DWMA to learn how to control it before they accidentally sliced someone's head off. Meisters probably flocked here because there were hopefully rules about partnering with someone far older than you, and/or they wanted to meet their partners and start their training in early.

Or maybe there was something age-related in the rules that I had missed due to focusing more on scanning for Witchly things to avoid doing. Either was equally possible.

Rex had managed to drag me halfway to the science labs before I suddenly panicked, realizing that there was absolutely no way that Stein would have let anyone else teach that class, before just as suddenly un-panicking, remembering that Stein wasn't hired yet and thus I didn't have to find an excuse to keep Rex between us at all times or something.

Except Stein _would_ get hired eventually, and I'd need to find some kind of excuse then. Shit.

Valiantly, I tried to stay preoccupied and worried while the lady in charge was teaching us about the various ways we could identify gunpowder and other explosive elements, but I lost the uneven struggle as she dragged in an old-school movie projector and began playing clips of various explosion types and illustrating their differences on the whiteboard. Apparently, this was something we all needed to know, as whether political or EAT, we'd probably eventually run into a scenario where someone had blown something up, and our split-second recognition might save lives, or at least direct energies.

Apparently, if we moved onto EAT, this class would become Forensics, and that was _definitely_ something Stein wouldn't allow anyone else teach. He'd probably duel this lady –or whoever else was currently in charge of it– for the honor, scalpel to ruler or some shit like that.

Heck, who was I kidding. Stein would loom ominously over the other candidate in the dead of night with a scalpel in hand and menacing cackle screwed firmly onto his face. Dude had an evil sense of humor.

Regardless, apparently this Science class was also strictly in practical terms, boiled down to as little firm knowledge as possible so that we could absorb the most in one sitting, as opposed to the schools I was used to, wherein everything was padded out to make _sure_ you got it through your thick skull. Understandable either way –this method was to stuff as much into our collective heads as possible, the other one was to make sure everybody at various stages of understanding and mental acuity could memorize and regurgitate –er, _learn_ what was on the test.

I had to say, I kind of respected the DWMA's increasingly obvious sink-or-swim mentality when it came to learning. If you couldn't keep up in class, you took extra time out of your day, you got tutors or study partners, you worked hard on your own: or you failed the _fuck_ out of it. And since I think the DWMA also operated in a fuzzy area that was neither high school nor college/university, whatever grades you got didn't really matter in applying to another school, since you either wouldn't have to or the gloss of the attached DWMA prestige would shine right over a few failed or bad grades. The only real reason to be concerned as a student was if you were failing enough classes to risk expulsion, which was ruthlessly brilliant in a way, because this system was guaranteed to weed out slackers or people here for glory and no work. The classes were condensed but thick with meaning, and if you started slipping, getting lazy or not seeing the point, there was no one to catch you but yourself and your partner.

Me, despite the strain it would be putting on my now dubiously-existent free time, I was more than willing to put in the effort for every class. Sure, aside from busting my cover, the history of this world might not be relevant to my life as a whole, but it was A) interesting and B) possibly something that would help me someday in the field. Same for all my other classes, with the possible exception of mathematics. The DWMA taught them for a reason and I was going to blindly trust that the organization which had been working on teaching for 800 years knew what it was doing when it came to education.

Just a blind guess, obviously. It was somewhat helped by the fact that people could sense and see souls in this world, which cut out a lot of the usual bullshit and red tape that humans seemed to delight in surrounding themselves with. At the DWMA, people had a tendency to know what you were feeling like and what kind of a person you were, even if you tried to hide or deny it, which was apparently invaluable in creating a good education environment.

We got to explore the lab, with a promise that the next A Day we'd get to start mixing explosives –though in nonviable ways– before we all washed up and headed to lunch. Along the way, something occurred to me, and I made sure to mention it to Rex after we got our food and got settled.

"So like, how come you're in the same classes as me?" I asked, jabbing my spoon at him. I'd opted for some kind of cheesy rice thing that promised to be healthy (though not overly so), while Rex had contented himself with a humble burger that had a disgusting amount of leafy green things in it. "You've been in the NOT class for what, three years?"

"Five." Rex answered, munching contentedly.

"Right, yeah, five years, and I'm pretty sure I all but broke the test with how hard I failed some parts of it."

It hadn't escaped my notice that most of the other kids in my History course, at least, had been twinkly-eyed middle schoolers or _younger_.

"How come you're with me?"

"I've been studying hard." Rex explained, setting down his hamburger. "I, um…"

I grabbed his hand before he could grab his earring, giving him a wordless look as he blinked at me in surprise.

"You have ketchup on your hand, dude."

"O-oh, right…" Rex laughed sheepishly as I let go and he aborted his automatic nervous tic. "Uh, anyways, I'm eighteen, so technically speaking I've finished all the classes I'm supposed to have taken to fulfill a GED, which means I can shadow you through all your own classes and work on extra coursework in my own time if I want to."

I furrowed my eyebrows. "Remind me again what a GED is? I've like heard the term before, but not what it means."

"Graduate Equivalency Degree or General Education Diploma, kinda varies on where you are." Rex answered, picking up his hamburger again. "It basically means I have the equivalent learning of someone with a high school diploma."

"So if this was a regular school, you'd have graduated."

"Yup."

"Buuuut you haven't, because you need a partner."

Rex laughed nervously and didn't answer, averting his eyes. The corner of one of my own eyes twitched.

_I'll drag this out of you eventually, Rayner. We're partners. You can't avoid me forever._

"So anyways, we start after-school combat training today." I said, changing the subject reluctantly. My knowledge of anime tropes –and human psychology– told me that trying to push Rex to tell me when he clearly didn't want to was doomed to failure. If I kept pressuring him, he'd feel defensive and on-edge, both inconducive to him spilling what I presumed to be an intimate secret of some kind –and that was intimate in the self of personal and private, not kinky.

_I think._

After all, it wasn't like I _knew_ what was going on with Rex.

In any case, while my admittedly-fuzzy knowledge of psychology told me that pushing someone who was on edge would only make them feel inclined to lash out, my knowledge of anime tropes told me that Rex would lash out, we'd have an explosive argument, and he'd either say something that shocked me to my core _or_ I would inadvertently say something that cut him too close to the quick, and he would run off without communicating to me at all, starting off a long period of dramatic tension between us that would almost certainly eventually culminate in a life-threatening event in which one of us saved the other's life and everything Rex had hidden would come spilling out, affirming our bonds in a joyous rush of trust, personal exposure, and forgiveness.

And sure, doing that might've been the easier route in some ways, but I doubted I had the patience for that sort of long dramatic tension, not to mention I was leery of heading down any road with "potential death/life-threatening event" signposted on it. Enough things would probably be trying to kill me in the ensuing months without me going _looking_ for more trouble.

Alas, that meant that I would have to find some other way of prying Rex's past out of him, preferably without engineering such a life-saving event on my own end so that he would end up spilling everything to me in a grateful rush. It was a brilliant plan, but also the sort of thing that would probably come back to bite me in a thousand different ways later, and that was just if I pulled it off successfully. Purposefully endangering my partner in order to force him to tell me his secrets would make some pretty tasty blackmail material for Medusa or Arachne, for instance.

_Not today, you evil bitches. I'm smarter than that._

"You ever done that before? Like with your last partner or on your own time or whatever?" I asked, trying to sound neutral and not accusatory in any way. Rex had been here five years, and he obviously wanted to try for EAT. It wouldn't be odd for him to have taken extracurricular combat classes over that time.

"Uh, I did a little with my first partner." Rex said, and something flickered across his face…something like sadness or regret. I made note of the expression, but didn't call him out on it. "And I tried a bit afterwards, but I'm…n-not really suited for hand-to-hand combat."

"You are a bit of a weed." I said, deadpan, and Rex made an offended noise, wilting comedically.

"I-I'm not _that_ skinny…"

He had a point there. Rex wasn't anything as sticklike as Crona, say: he just wasn't excessively muscular and was tall enough that his black suit seemed to emphasize rather than conceal his long limbs. I'd yet to see him shirtless –though I darkly suspected this universe would contrive to arrange it eventually– but so far as I knew, just looking at his food intake, Rex had a perfectly healthy amount of flesh on his bones.

It was just kinda fun to rag on him, and for lack of any other sufficiently superfluous insults, I was gently poking fun at his physical appearance.

"Eh, maybe not." I agreed amicably. "So, anything I should watch out for, be prepared for? Since you've done this before and all."

Rex hummed thoughtfully.

"Well, the important thing to remember is that you're learning how to survive, not how to look cool, so its best to focus on conserving energy and executing the move perfectly. A fluid, controlled movement will always be better and arrive faster than one you try to make look good…"

We continued this conversation into our after-lunch study hall, since this was the first day and even the DWMA didn't assign a whole lot of homework. I had a feeling this hour would fill up later, when I had ongoing projects to work on both inside and outside my school hours. For now, though, it was a nice opportunity to chat with Rex and learn more about the DWMA culture and way of doing things, which would hopefully contribute to me never getting lost inside the school. Apparently it was practically a rite of passage around here…

Math was, of course, boring as shit. Even the DWMA couldn't change the fact that it was just learning formulas and equations, although they did work on investing us a lot more by using practical applications, with promises of hands-on work that would hopefully help drive the relevant equations into our heads a lot better. Someday we might have to build a barricade or something to protect ourselves or others, or measure distances, and this was the class that would teach us to do it.

Still didn't change the fact that it was math, though.

As the clocks ticked over into 2.00 in the afternoon, Rex and I had to part ways for the last class of the day, since it was a meister-only class and he was, obviously, a Weapon. I'd be doing this every Monday and Wednesday, and a thought tickled in the back of my head as Rex left me on the threshold of the classroom. He'd presumably still have his Weapons course on Tuesdays and Thursdays…which gave me at least two hours every week in which to do whatever the hell I wanted, completely free from any kind of partner supervision. Rex would be held up at the school, which meant that I could do all sorts of things that I didn't want him knowing about.

Granted, I didn't really have any concrete plans on advancing my magic or thwarting canon yet, but the knowledge that I _could_ plan without interruptions was certainly reassuring.

Sid took the helm of this class again, welcoming us all in as I cast my eyes over the various other students. I didn't recognize most of them, but I saw Meme and Anya here, as well as Ao a few rows down. I didn't see Akane, but given as he was powerful enough to be in EAT _and_ some kind of special-ops program under Sid, I doubted that he needed to know the basics at this point.

"Hey, kids. I see you've all made it to the end of your first day." Sid said, and there was a muted ripple of laughter across the room. "This is Meister Studies, a lesser aspect of Phasmology."

He turned to write _Phasmology_ on the board, underlining it with a swipe of chalk before continuing to write in what looked like Greek beneath it.

_Phasmology  
From φάσμα (phásma) and -λογία (-logía)._

_Phasma – From φαίνω (phaínō) and -μα (-ma)_

" _Phasma_ is an Ancient Greek word with two sections, _phaínō_ , meaning 'to bring to light, to cause to appear,' and _-ma_ , a nominal suffix: and _-logía_ is of course -ology, 'the study of' a thing." Sid told the class, scratching it out on the board, then starting another list. "The word _Phasma_ was used under five different definitions by the Greeks,"

_1\. Apparition, phantom._

_2\. Appearance, phenomenon._

_3\. Images or types of realities._

_4\. Sign from heaven, portent, omen._

_5\. Monster, prodigy._

"-and as you can see, _Phasma_ is where we get the modern word 'phantom.' Looking at the board now, I'm sure you've all noticed that each of the five definitions have something to do with souls, species, Soul Wavelengths, and how people define them across various cultures. Phasmology is the scientific word for soul studies, and if you intend to advance to the EAT class as a combative partnership, it's going to become a huge part of your future."

We murmured agreement.

"Everyone in here is a meister, myself included, and the reason that we have separated you from any partners you might have for this class is because the way meisters and Weapons harness soul energy is very different." Sid continued to explain, tapping the chalk against the board. "You can think of a meister as the ignition for the whole system. Broadly speaking, anyone could become a meister –even members of another species."

I assumed he was making an oblique reference to Enrique, the meister for South America's Death Scythe, who just so happened to be a monkey. Like literally, an actual monkey.

"Your purpose is simply to send energy into the Weapon, who can convert and use it. This can be as simple as swinging your partner in an attack, or as complex as compressing your Wavelength into projectiles that they can fire, or even Resonating. Weapons are typically conducive to other people's Wavelengths and most other forms of energy, which is why they make for poor meisters themselves."

Sid turned back to face us and crossed his index fingers over each other.

"Its like two pieces of copper wire trying to conduct electricity with no flow. It _can_ be done, but its tricky, and usually requires a stronger bond than normal –a bond formed by circumstance or by family. Similarly, a meister trying to wield two Weapons will generally need a much stronger soul, or Weapon partners who have that aforementioned bond."

"What about the Death Scythe in Western Europe?" someone called curiously from outside my line of sight.

"You would be referring to Justin Law, correct?" Sid replied. "He's an exception. You realize, what we learn about in this class are generalities. Some Weapons have large enough Wavelengths to fight on their own, whether they start out powerful or whether they've grown that way through hard work. There are even some meisters who are combat-capable enough to fight without a Weapon partner in the traditional sense. And you are _all_ worth more than how compatible you are with your partner or how well the two of you fight together. If worst comes to worst, you can always kick your opponent in the head or something. Don't be too caught up in fancy moves."

Sid turned back to the board and started writing another list.

_Type (Gun, Scythe, Knife, etc.)_

_Utility Meister_

_Assassination_

_Genius_

"Meisters are generally defined by their type –what kind of Weapon they have learned to fight with. Some meisters can only wield one type of Weapon, and face rejection responses from all others even when their bond is steady. Others can multishift. Generally, though, you're known for the one type you are most comfortable with –a Knife Meister, a Scythemeister, a Spear Meister, etc. Following this,"

Sid tapped his chalk against the second line of words, standing aside and against the board so that everyone on all the tiers could see them.

"-a Utility Meister is someone comfortable with harnessing the abilities of multiple Weapons at the same time: in other words, someone who can dual-wield. This takes a lot of practice and skill, not to mention finding the right partners, so Utility Meisters are very rare. Less rare are the Assassination Meisters, those who have mastered more covert forms of weaponry and who are often skilled in areas and techniques that focus on the development of the five common senses rather than Soul Perception or anything similar. Assassination-type meisters are often defined by the fact that they don't need their Weapon to kill or incapacitate their opponents, even if they don't always follow the traditional route of covert operations skills."

Well, that certainly explained Blackstar, whose deafening loudmouth was rather at odds with his designation as an assassin. Sid himself probably counted in the same category, as a matter of fact, since he had given several skilled meisters trouble when wielding nothing but an ordinary stone cross that he had ripped up from the ground. He'd even been able to create anime-esque techniques with it, such as the "Living End" move wherein he jumped up and used his tombstone to essentially clothesline an entire person into the ground with a stylized flash of cross-like purple light.

"Lastly," Sid drew a circle around the final category. "There are what we would call Genius-type meisters. These are meisters with such powerful Wavelengths and control over said Wavelengths that they can essentially pick up and master any Weapon within a very short period of time. They are by far the rarest category of meister, and currently there is only one individual known in this division."

Awed whispers ghosted throughout the room, and I could almost sense ambitions to be the next Genius-type meister rising all around me. I didn't bother getting excited –I was almost one thousand percent sure Sid was referring to Stein, who was the strongest meister to graduate from the school in all of the DWMA's history, at least until Blackstar in the manga. That was more than a bit of an insurmountable achievement gap, not to mention the fact that I wasn't even _from_ this world, so my ability to conduct Wavelengths and power my Weapon _at all_ was kinda dubious, never mind becoming some kind of meister savant.

 _My_ only ambition was to get this all done as fast as possible, then go back home. Becoming the strongest or the most skilled or the most famous wasn't really on my radar.

Sid spent the rest of the lesson talking about the most famous examples in some of the categories, and I noted with interest that he didn't really talk about any of the _modern_ equivalents. He didn't announce what type of meister he was, or talk about anyone in the EAT class or their abilities, or invite us to share what kind of training we'd had yet or what area we were starting to specialize in. This omission was a subtle reminder that the DWMA was a _combative_ school with live missions, and even the abilities of my fellow students could be confidential, given the kind of covert operations they might be sent on. Obviously the school wasn't trying _too_ hard, because students practiced in front of each other all the time and I was well aware of the presence of a healthy gossiping grapevine, but it was obvious that the teachers weren't going to make it as ridiculously easy as "just come to class" for anyone who might've infiltrated the school to gather information about certain pairs or people.

The DWMA seemed to be like that. There were areas you could go if you pushed and places you could get to if you dug, but they didn't just _hand_ you all of the extra information. They gave you a baseline, and if you were content to coast along on the firm basics and become a steady, reliable cog in the machine, the more power to you. You had the framework and you had the positions set up for you for when you left the academy. If you wanted to be _more_ , if you wanted to excel or grow in any specific field, they pointed you to the tools and left you to it, with or without the relevant instructions. You _proved_ how much you wanted it and how far you'd go by how hard you worked at improving yourself with them, essentially earning the power that came after all of your struggles. It was all very _shounen_.

In any case, I took my first steps along that secondary path when I pulled out my makeshift map as the end-of-day bell rang, and headed down to meet Rex at the in-school dancer's studio where they'd be teaching us sword forms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: December 30th, 12.36 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: December 30th, 11.32 AM USA Central Time


	8. Introductory Course B

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to look up Qrow's fight with Winter in _RWBY_ and Cloud's fight with Sephiroth in _Advent Children_ to learn how people use unreasonably-large cleaver-like swords in anime. Let it never be said that I don't do my research.

_Arya's POV:_

Say what you will about our fighting prowess, Rex and I at least had the "transform-and-catch" part of partnership down. He writhed out of existence in a flash of bluish light, and I moved my hands out and caught him by the handle effortlessly. Sure, he was still heavy enough that I _needed_ to hold him with both hands, which I figured counted against the perfect sync of proper meister-Weapon teams, but hey, our partnership was barely a week old. We'd get there in time.

More to the point, though, I learned a lot of things about Rex in quick succession during the instructor's quick spiel, more scientific than the generalities he had assured me of in our little baseball-cage practice session. For one, his shape and mass meant that his center of gravity was towards the tip, rather than Rex's closest weapon cousin, the Zweihänder. This, in turn, meant that Rex was top heavy enough for me to need to change my grip for our braces and blocks –if we went into a bodylock with someone else, or anything else that involved momentum straining against his blade, I'd need to brace my arm against the middle part of the back to add leverage, or turn it so the flat faced my opponent and I could splay my hand against the opposite side to boost my pushing power.

I learned that one painfully and by experience, as we dueled with some EAT guy named Tom, who was in perfect sync with his Weapon and could thus bat us around like a ping-pong ball, despite the fact that his fencing foil partner was a fraction of Rex's size and mass. He'd swiped his foil diagonally and I'd moved to block like I'd seen in all the pictures and gifs and things of _Final Fantasy_ , holding Rex angled with both hands around his grip, and the force and momentum of Tom's blade had whacked Rex's edge –thankfully the blunt edge, but still– right into my forehead. Typical DWMA strategy –learn through experience and fear of said experience happening to you again, whether it was painful or just embarrassing.

Tom was chill about it though, showing me how I could block something like that properly, and otherwise taking my misstep in stride, assuming it was the usual business of someone working out what they were doing rather than anything else. There was definitely something in this whole "pair NOTs with EATs and have them practice separately" after the instructor ran us NOTs through various common/basic sword forms. You couldn't expect a fencer to fight the same way as someone with a broadsword or a katana, but we all could slash and stab by virtue of having blades, and we all had balance to keep during a fight. There were some basics we could all stand to learn.

It was kind of…frustrating, though. I'd spent hours and hours and days and days in becoming something at least approaching a competent shot with my Colt, and though I hadn't put in nearly so much time learning to use the spare Little Tom pistol that Mey-rin had given me, I could assume I'd be nearly as good with it or any other type of gun. I hadn't spent that much time working on my fencing, but I _had_ practiced extensively over several months, and it was conceivable that I might actually win a serious fight with a fencing saber. Having been suddenly degraded, as it were, to a clumsy klutz who couldn't even execute a block properly…kinda grated on me.

I had to keep that frustration down, though. Rex would think it was his fault, and even though it technically _was_ , letting him think that was a dick move. Arguably, the fault was just as much mine as his, since I wasn't adjusting to something that he couldn't help. If I wanted this partnership to work, I had to put in the effort to _make_ it work, not just coast along and demand that Rex do everything for me, then get bitchy when he didn't compensate for _my_ failings.

That didn't mean the lack of fluidity and practiced movement didn't suck, though. I wanted to be _good_ again, wanted the confidence and reassurance that came from being a competent fighter. Being taken several steps backwards was frustrating, even if it was benign. My usual modus operandi was to throw up magic walls or something similar in order to shape the landscape to give me an advantage, then fight from there, because it honestly wasn't likely that I'd be able to win a straight face-to-face fight even with magic and my usual weapons. Being unable to use my magic –due to not wanting to get axed by righteously angry meisters and Weapons– or fight with my gun –due to not wanting to upset Rex by relying on something else in a fight– pretty much cut out all of my typical moves. I was starting blank from the drawing board again, and not liking it, because I had a whole _other_ drawing board full of perfectly good and detailed scribbles that I couldn't use because of pure stupid circumstance.

Frustrating didn't even begin to cover it.

In any case, I had to keep Rex from seeing, sensing, or knowing that in any way, because again, it wasn't his fault, but he'd obviously think it was, and that would just completely ruin our efforts to work together as a team, especially a Weapon-meister team. I'd just have to kinda…get over it. Eh, it'd improve with time as we got properly into sync and started working together with more experience.

This was fine.

_***Time Skip***_

Several hours of training later, I was staggering down the lengthy DWMA stairs with noodle legs as Rex plodded worriedly in my wake. After a while of training with the why and how of swinging a sword, and another hour or so of sparring with Tom and his partner, we'd switched to individual sessions with the class teacher, who had corrected my tendency to keep Rex low, unconsciously catering to his heavier blade, and had me change my makeshift stance a little to be wider and more balanced, rather that leaning towards the tight, defensible line I was used to for fencing.

All things being equal, staying in a combat stance for several hours on end left the muscles in my legs wobbly and warm, like I'd been riding a horse the whole time. One would think that merely bending your knees slightly and holding most of your weight in your hips and thighs wouldn't be hard, or put that much strain on you, but my half-uncoordinated steps and swaying gait told a different story. I hadn't felt this way since I first started horse-riding, or when I had also first started exercising with an eye towards combat readiness. Still, nothing a hot bath and more exercise couldn't fix. I'd be fine.

"Um…are you gonna be okay?" Rex asked, stepping closer nervously as I paused to take a breather with both hands on my knees, wheezing.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm good." I panted, waving one hand. "Just…just getting into the swing of things. Been a while since I did this sort of thing."

Rex scratched under his hat, giving me a concerned look. Apparently the interim between "fine" and "now" was a long one. Still, we were about halfway down the steps or less, and the way the stairs bent and kinked backwards towards the school meant that throwing caution to the winds and straddling the banisters to slide down them would only take me down a flight or two –not to mention the steepness of the steps and accompanying outer balustrade meant that there was every chance I'd pick up too much speed and just straight-up start freefalling, only to jerk to a stop as I hit the stone railing for the next level and it rammed my ovaries up into my eyeballs. The stairs also extended outwards from the school in some places without any kind of railing whatsoever, so that was definitely nope.

I was thinking far too much about this highly implausible idea. Not a good sign.

"Uh, anyways." I panted, then straightened with a groan and a crackle of my spine, looking down at the huge expanse of steps with trepidation. "We should…probably get going."

Rex started and turned to go down the stairs again, before glancing back at me. I realized I hadn't moved, and groaned internally once again, taking a single wobbling step forward. Even then, it was an effort, and Rex nearly had to catch me as my loosened muscles made me stumble. I was willing to bet cold hard cash that if I'd been wearing a skirt or a button-up shirt, I'd have flown right into him, possibly smashing his face into my cleavage or flashing anyone and everyone behind me an upshot of my underwear, but as it was, Rex only had to reach out and steady me.

"If you're tired from all that exercise, I can carry you down the rest of the steps." he said, and I blinked. Then blinked again.

"Dude, I'm not twelve."

"But you're also worn out from all the training we did today." Rex pointed out reasonably. "I promise I won't drop you or anything."

I considered that for a few seconds. On the one hand, it was kind of childish to piggyback down the rest of the way, not to mention injurious to my presumed dignity as one of the older NOT students, but on the other hand, I had worked really hard today and I could take a shortcut when it was offered. It wasn't like this'd be a regular thing, since I'd get less and less exhausted the more and more I practiced.

"Eh, sure." I said with a shrug, before making a grabby motion at him with both hands. "I've been carrying you all this time, it's only fair that we switch."

We took a few seconds to figure out how to arrange ourselves, especially on the uneven steps, but eventually Rex had me hoisted over his back, my arms around his neck and his hands under my knees, ready to be carried down the steps in fine style. My grip tightened nervously, as did his, when Rex first started walking, but eventually he got into his rhythm, and I hummed thoughtfully, draping myself more comfortably over his back. I could get used to this luxury.

"You know, you can rely on me." Rex said after a minute or so of carrying me down the steps.

"I know." I agreed, twisting my head to rest my chin on his shoulder, rather than the crown of his head, which was currently occupied by a hat. "Just kinda used to doing everything on my own, I guess."

Rex's shoulder squirmed under my chin. "You're…um, pushing yourself a lot." he admitted reluctantly. "I know you want to get to EAT, and so do I, but…you don't need to go so hard. We aren't on a time limit or anything."

I hummed, but didn't answer that one. Fact of the matter was, I sort of _was_ on a time limit, in the sense that I needed to get this all done ASAP. In the ordinary run of things, I had my whole career ahead of me here, and it could take me years or more to work my way up to EAT and get my partner to Death Scythe status. That was a life goal, not something to achieve in a few weeks or months.

In the _normal_ run of things.

Despite the abnormally-higher chance of skirt-flippage or accidental flashing, being in an anime _was_ pretty neat. I wasn't about to lie through my teeth and say it wasn't. But on the other hand, even if my parents and I weren't close, I wanted to go _home_. I wanted to go back to _my_ idea of normal, where life was mundane and the worst I had to worry about was delayed production on a show or something. I wanted to get back to the technology and culture I knew, and, it had to be said, I wanted to get back home before my parents gave me up for dead or something. On the not-illogical assumption that the time I spent here was the same as time back home, I'd have been missing for over a year at this point. And if time _didn't_ progress? If I somehow popped back into my room mere seconds after I'd shot myself into this mess in the first place?

There were a host of problems with that, starting on my very visible scars and ending with the fact that I was now physically very much older. Okay, sure, maybe the transition from 16 to 18 (since I'd almost certainly be stuck here for another few months at least) wasn't _that_ much, but I was pretty sure my parents _would_ notice. They were parents. Their child's age was the sort of thing they were perceptive about.

In any case, I _was_ on a time limit. I wanted and needed to push myself to a potentially reckless extent in order to strengthen my reserves and boost my combative power, and I didn't have time to consider this world's "normal," not as long as I kept my cover of being a very normal and unmagical denizen of it intact.

I could hardly tell Rex any of that, though, hence my noncommittal hum.

"It'll get easier with time." I said after a few seconds. "I'll build up my muscles more and get used to it, and your Weapon form will get lighter once we'll start improving our bond. This probably won't happen again after, like, this week."

Now it was Rex's turn to hum, sounding much more pleased and enthusiastic than I had.

He walked onwards in silence for another flight or so, me resting my chin contentedly on his shoulder and watching the sun –now drowsing and near-drooling as it sank lower and lower in the sky– hover over Death City's scenic skyline. We were now on level and just below some of the larger buildings, and it was that which prompted me to speak up again.

"You said you live in Death City, right?" I asked. "How come you don't bunk with your family?"

Rex shrugged, which was weird to feel in my current position.

"Mom was so excited about me coming to the DWMA that I kinda felt guilty about going back after…"

He trailed off rather quickly, but I could fill in the blanks. So, whatever had happened with his last partner had been bad enough that Rex had thought about _leaving_ the DWMA? Considering how much he seemed to want to become an EAT and be a hero and all that, it must've been something else. On the other hand, though, he could just mean coming back to live at his house or family apartment or whatever in Death City, but being reluctant to do so after he lost his partner –or whatever it was– seemed to indicate that there was some kind of social pressure at work, or some weird way in which Rex's partner had tangled themselves up in his family dynamic.

This mystery was starting to make me grind my teeth. Every option I tried to slot in was either too severe, too mild, or just plain illogical. The teachers wouldn't be concerned about Rex if it had just been a case of two partners going their separate ways, the students wouldn't be gossipy and smug about him getting a new one if Rex's partner had somehow contrived to get KIA (despite being a NOT student), and Rex was too jumpy and eager to deny the subject's very existence for it to have been abuse. If his last partner was toxic for him in some way, Rex would scuff the floor with his shoe and admit it to me like a downcast puppy, not frantically deny that there was anything different at all about the way the other students treated us. And he couldn't have accidentally murdered his last partner, either, because the other students would be concerned too, and not just the teachers –not to mention the fact that, Weapon gene aside, Rex didn't really have the stuff for even an accidental homicide.

Still, there were the same roadblocks from before. I couldn't force Rex to tell me, because he was already on edge about it whenever the subject was even brought up, never mind discussed, and it'd be all too easy to push him too far: and I couldn't ask around, because even outside of anime tropes it was all too likely that the truth would be obfuscated in a dozen different opinions and interpretations. Essentially, I was stuck until Rex either started trusting me more or one of the teachers took me aside, since they seemed to know just as much about it as he did.

Alas.

Still, this was nice. We were obviously getting used to each other –Rex was comfy enough to offer to carry me the rest of the way down the steps, and I was comfy enough to accept. Despite the fact that he just read textbooks in class, we were spending time together there, and this after-school training was definitely going to be a huge boost in how well we worked together. Sure, I had gripes –the inefficiency of his Weapon form, the slowness of me trying to learn how to use it, whatever the _fuck_ was going on with his prior partner– but I would've been extremely suspicious if I just found the perfect partner straight off the bat, and we immediately started working together like clockwork. Even Maka and Soul had to do a little work to become the amazing team that they were, and they still bickered a lot all the way through the series. Tsubaki held Blackstar's metaphorical toddler leash half the time, rather than being an equally-contributing partner, and Kid, Liz, and Patty all had their neurotic tendencies that sometimes combined in bad ways. Partnerships weren't _perfect_ , not even for the best teams in the series. People were people, and they had arguments and friction even when they trusted each other implicitly. I just needed to keep that in mind and not expect the moon out of either Rex or myself.

Speaking of…

"Its like what, five in the afternoon?" I asked after a bit. Rex shuffled awkwardly, shifting one of the arms hooked under my legs to look at his watch.

"6.23, actually." he answered shortly. Huh. Well, that explained why I was so hungry.

"So like, after we grab dinner, we should work on training _you_ for a change." I said. "I know I'm the meister and I'll be swinging you around and stuff in a fight, but we still need to _get_ to a fight, and if I get knocked out or something, I want you to be able to defend both of us and/or run as needed."

Rex made a mournful noise.

"You've been exercising for two hours straight." he complained. "Any more and you won't have any muscles left to tear. You can't even walk down the stairs right now!"

I tugged on a lock of his hair, pulling his head to the side slightly.

"Hey, I know what I'm doing. And besides, it'll mostly be you that's running around and shit. I'll be offering friendly advice and whatnot from the sidelines."

Rex groaned, head hanging, as we came within sight of the bottom of the steps.

_***Time Skip***_

The morning after Rex and I had started on that makeshift training regimen, I found myself, annoyingly enough, regarding my usual routine with a bit of suspicion. There wasn't anything wrong with maintaining physical fitness! I'd been doing it for ages, and it was a full-fledged habit by now. And besides, in my jam-packed day, when else was I going to do the exercises that had saved my life several times over in the past?

Sure, I did a somewhat exhaustive compilation of exercise moves first thing in the morning, then went to school and did a shitload of stair climbing, then had an hour-long gym routine immediately afterwards with a focus on agility and cardio, but that was _fine_. I had the whole rest of the school day to rest and recuperate before the extra combat classes that went from 4.00 to 6.00. That was a totally normal exercise regimen for a person at the school, right? I mean, it had to be. Just look at how jacked Blackstar's arms were.

No, this was normal and fine, and even if it _wasn't_ , I was too paranoid to just drop the extra stuff. It had been fine before, it was fine now, and on the plus side, I could continue happily guzzling the many forgotten flavors of modern fast food without any major adverse effects, since my calories were burning out almost as soon as I'd gotten them. Which was totally still fine. Yeah. Probably…

I smacked the side of my face and shook my head rapidly. I needed to stop thinking about it! Naigus was the school nurse, or would be after Medusa was booted, and she saw me every day at gym, so if there was anything to be concerned about, she'd know!

The worries that Rex had planted in my head about my potentially unhealthy work ethic aside, the rest of Tuesday spun by in an impatient leg-bouncing blur as I waited for the Weapon class, which Rex was still part of, though Sid had put him on an independent course of study. With Rex busy, I finally had time for my first important pet project: strategizing.

As of right now, I had four main concerns, and I scribbled them out in Italian in my journal/grimoire, waiting in a comfortable nook with skull-shaped furniture nearby the dancer's studio.

`Problem 1: Create Death Scythe and access books.`

`Problem 2: Canon vs. manga?`

`Problem 3: Thwarting evil.`

`Problem 4: Interdimensional research.`

I struck through the first one –that was already being taken care of, in the form of teaming up with Rex. The second was more problematic, as I'd have no indication of which direction things were going until almost too late, which moved me down to the third and most important point on my list.

Planning how to thwart Medusa, and other associated evil bastards.

That was going to be tricky. Still, I wasn't going into it blind. I knew what she wanted and what she planned, and for the next few months at least, I had a clear run of…well, arranging and executing preliminary steps. Not that I was _going_ to –in terms of raw intelligence, Medusa had me beat in a thousand different ways, so the best method for me to go about beating her was to not craft a plan so ingenious that I created a Xanatos Gambit for myself, but to come up with something that I could begin and execute on the spot, so quickly that she didn't have _time_ to muster her intelligence and counter-plan.

A brilliant strategy, but one with a single small flaw –I had _no idea_ what kind of plan would do that.

Well, taking it step by step, I wouldn't really need to _do_ anything to interfere if things went the anime route. The anime was, by and large, a far more cheerful place. People didn't die or turn permanently evil there. If this turned out to be the anime, Rex and I could probably take the time to sip some pina coladas on a beach somewhere in amongst our slaying of Kishin Eggs.

(Whatever the hell a pina colada was. Some kind of cocktail? Martini? The world of alcohol was a mystery to me.)

So, on the assumption that things went down the anime route, there was by and large nothing I needed to do to interfere with anything, save if I decided to be _really_ bold and try to prevent the Kishin's rising to begin with. That being said, Medusa only resorted to Asura because Crona had failed to become the appropriately unhinged murderous deity she'd wanted him to be, so if I cockblocked her from Asura (a sentence and a mental image I never wanted to have again), she'd probably just pour on the pressure for poor Crona and that was _absolutely_ not something I wanted to be responsible for.

Okay, so all things being anime, I was just gonna…leave it alone and not. touch. _Anything_.

That brought me to the manga, and it was with a grimace that I regarded my page of notes. Unlike the anime, where everything was sunny if you had the power of courage and _shounen_ tropes on your side, the manga was more the grimdark kind of thing where everything went wrong eventually, in some small way or another, despite maintaining the slender thread of hope and human connections. Presuming things went the way of the manga –I flipped back to the notes I'd taken earlier to summarize what plot I remembered– Crona would be abducted/coerced to leave the DWMA by Medusa after Joe Buttataki arrived at the DWMA.

Hmm…

In theory, I could circumvent all the planning and plotting nonsense by befriending Crona during his time at the DWMA, then monitor Crona's cell 24/7 after Joe Buttataki showed up, and thus "conveniently" stroll by when Medusa was trying to guilt him into leaving and boot her snaky ass halfway across the city. That'd involve a certain amount of insomnia and/or magic surveillance, but I could probably swing it.

I mentally filed that under "Plan A."

Plan B, or perhaps Plan A: Part 2, was me finding a way to circumvent the fact that Crona's corruption and insanity were somewhat key to locking away the Kishin during the battle on the moon. Asura was essentially unkillable, so that was the best option that anyone could come up with, and even then, there was a heavy implication that he'd be able to wiggle free eventually anyways, even with Crona using the power of BREW to lock him away.

Wait a second.

Wait just a second.

BREW!

Sure, I wasn't entirely certain that BREW would _work_ for me, being a non-native member of this world, but it was _the_ most powerful Demon Tool created by Eibon. If I could figure out how to use it, and what to use it for, that'd definitely give me an edge…if I could acquire it.

More than that, though, thinking about BREW had me make another leap of logic, remembering the Book of Eibon, which together with BREW was essentially the summation of all of Eibon's wisdom. The Book of Eibon had the ability to lock things away within itself, which was how Greed!Noah started his collection and how the Black Mass isolated itself. So…in theory…if things went the manga route, I could somehow find a way to get my mitts on the Book of Eibon, then bring it back to Lord Death and politely ask to dump out all the extra creatures within, so as not to get them caught up in the ensuing maelstrom when I used it to suck in Asura like a slurpee. Lord Death could then caretake the book in much the same way he did Asura in his skin-bag for centuries prior.

Okay, so Plan A went as follows:

`When Joe Buttataki comes to Death City, establish why he's there. If he's there to investigate a mole rather than create new technology, set up a watch on Crona. Make sure Medusa doesn't kidnap him, ensure that he is reassured, therapized, and positively reinforced so that he doesn't go darkside in the meantime afterwards. Wait for the mission against Arachnophobia and for Kid to get captured, then either tag along with Spartoi for the rescue mission or follow Sid, Tezca, and the others trying to ambush Greed!Noah in order to grab the Book of Eibon. Talk to Lord Death about plans for the book, and shake out all the extra creatures inside so that they don't get hurt when I use the book to capture Asura. Tag along on the moon mission, yank him into the book, everyone goes home happy.`

Not bad, even if I did say so myself. It was a good plan, and more importantly, doable. This was something I could manage even at my current power level, though it'd be pretty dicey. Assuming that I was improving and growing stronger all this time, I would be much more confident about getting it done.

Of course, I'd need to make a Plan B, and possibly several more down the alphabet, but right now, this was the best I could manage. After all, I'd need to adjust for several moving parts in case me stopping Medusa from kidnapping Crona changed the timeline in such a way that the Arachnophobia mission didn't go down, or Kid didn't get captured by Noah. In that case, I'd have to make several adjustments very quickly in order to keep up the pace, not to mention the fact that a berserking Crona had been the one to finally, _finally_ off Medusa in the manga, and she obviously needed to die if anyone ever wanted to be happy.

Still, for a first draft, this was a good plan, and I'd need to rip this page out and incinerate it later, to make sure no spiders or snakes got a peep at these notes. Actually, I'd need to do that for any material I didn't absolutely need, in order to keep anything horrific from happening if my diary/journal/grimoire fell into the wrong hands. Obviously I couldn't destroy the pages that summarized everything I knew about the characters and plot, despite how implicating that would be, but tearing them out and storing them inside the infinite capacities of my apocalypse bag would probably be safe enough. If anyone not me started rummaging around inside, they'd just find some old clothes in a normal rucksack, not the unending depths and myriad objects I could stick my arm into. My apocalypse bag was safe, at least until someone with magic started tampering with it, but even then, the magic used to create it was so different from anything in this world that it was entirely plausible that the Witches here wouldn't be _able_ to tamper with it.

Fingers crossed.

In any case, I needed to be finished planning anyways, because here Rex came, presumably done with his class. I shut my journal and stowed it in my satchel, standing up quickly and flashing him a bright smile.

"So what project has Sid got you doing?" I asked curiously as we both moseyed on over into the studio.

"Weapon history." Rex said, stretching a little as his shoulders popped. "How separate Weapon genes emerged, tracing them back through families, stuff like that."

I blinked. "There's genes for specific Weapon forms?" I asked dumbly.

"Yup." Rex nodded. "Swords were the first Weapons ever created, and our bloodline branched out into axes and spears. Scythes and hammers descended from the axe-Weapon gene, and spears branched out into guns and crossbones. Nobody's sure about the categories of Weapon beyond that, since a bunch of similar forms seemed to have developed at the same time from all the different genes."

I could kinda see that. An axe was an instrument with a long handle and a weaponized head, which was swung to create damage, and could easily be developed into a scythe –long handle, bladed head– or a hammer –long handle, flat head– which were both swung to create damage. A spear was a weapon that you threw, hence it was a projectile weapon, hence it wasn't too much of a stretch to imagine other forms of projectile weapons developing out of it.

"So like, what was the original sword form?" I asked. "Something like you, or a katana, or what?"

Rex shrugged.

"Nobody's sure on that one." he admitted. "Even with Lord Death, there are some historical things that we just can't confirm."

I supposed having a benevolent immortal _did_ help with writing history books. Eh, whatever –that was something to think about later, when Rex and I weren't busy grinding to become a full-fighting-form team.

Rex transformed in a flash, and I caught his blade before whirling him with a flourish, grinning smugly.

We could totally do this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally Posted: January 4th, 2021, 9.00 USA Central Time  
> Cross-Posted: January 4th, 2021, 9.00 USA Central Time


	9. Zodiac 100

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More fanart, yay!
> 
> Link: https://iliveonmylaptop.tumblr.com/post/639361163782717440/more-fanart-yessir-not-only-was-this-scene
> 
> Also, the next few chapters are going to be rocky, as per the plot demands, but I promise that everything will be okay eventually. Probably. Eh, interpersonal relationships are hard. I'm sure everything will come out alright in the end. Normally I don't warn you guys about stuff like this, but I figured with the absolute shitstorm that was 2020, at this point we all need, like, some advance warning for stuff that'll make us feel bad.

_Arya's POV:_

I so couldn't do this.

A month into my time at the DWMA, I was curled up inside a steaming bathtub in the communal girls' dorm showers, my mind racing. It was the first week of October, and even my upcoming birthday wasn't enough to distract me from the current situation. On the face of it, my birthday –even when it was my eighteenth birthday– paled in comparison to the issues I was dealing with. Another year come and gone really didn't matter much when I was considering, rather guiltily, _ditching_ my partner.

I had three reasons. One, despite my lowkey desperation as I pressed me and Rex's noses to the respective grindstone, we weren't any closer to moving as that vaunted Weapon-meister unit. His blade was still heavy, and seemed to get heavier sometimes when we argued. Two, we were arguing –not furiously, not often, but we had snippy conversations sometimes, and despite my best efforts I could tell that Rex knew I was frustrated with our partnership and lack of progress. Three, and this most crucially, I could tell that all the hard work and effort in the world wasn't going to win over months and months of devoted energy. It took years, sometimes, for a team to create a Death Scythe, and I could struggle and whine all I wanted, but things just took time sometimes.

I didn't have time.

Worst of all, I felt like a heel just by _thinking_ about jumping ship. Rex was a nice guy, and I'd consider us friends at this point, but through no fault of his own, we weren't making the progress I wanted and needed to make. I wanted to consider his feelings, I _wanted_ to keep him as my partner, but I couldn't stand the thought of dragging out years in this world as I clawed our way to the top. The fact that getting the books I needed to make my sigil was only the _middle_ goal of getting out of this world made me feel even more dismal. I didn't have that kind of time. I _couldn't_ have that kind of time.

And Rex was a nice guy. He was friendly and helpful and had majorly eased my transition into the academy life, and there was definitely _some_ kind of something about his last partner that made me think dissolving our partnership would have more emotional consequence than normal. I didn't want to do it. I didn't want to be that person.

But on the other hand, was I letting my feelings control my head? Rex was a very approachable guy: he'd find another partner _eventually_ , if I dropped him. Arguably a better one, since I'd leave this world eventually and Rex would be left all alone in any case. Was I letting my regard for Rex hold me back? I could easily make friends with Maka, since we shared being nerds, and then either have her borrow her father's access card or borrow Soul's own when he became a Death Scythe. It was a painless exercise that required only long and sustained cozening, and it could be done in a fraction of the time it took to make Rex into a Death Scythe.

But that would mean abandoning Rex. It would mean quitting on my commitments. It would mean _giving up_.

I didn't want to, but the plain simple fact was that I couldn't _force_ me and Rex to work together seamlessly, and we weren't making much progress otherwise. If we were two jigsaw pieces that just didn't quite fit together, no amount of shoving on my end would change that, and in that case, it was better for me to conserve energies and find a different puzzle piece to shack up with. No matter how it made Rex feel. No matter how much I liked him, he was a brief acquaintance of a month, and were his feelings more important to me than _getting home_?

I felt like a dick for saying it, but no, no they weren't. I hadn't known him for that long, and I didn't know him that much. I didn't know his family, his background, whatever weird shit had happened with his first meister –none of it. We were at the very least friendly acquaintances, but those and friendships terminated all the time. It wasn't like we were in love or something: Rex would probably get over it within half a year.

Yeah, and maybe if I repeated that enough, I'd start believing it.

I sighed, long and loud, sinking deeper into the frothy bubbles as I slumped downwards against the ceramic bath. This sucked. Rationality told me that bailing now was probably a good idea, before I got too attached, but at the same time, I hesitated. Was I giving up on this too soon? How soon _was_ too soon? Was I being a lazy coward and backing out of our partnership just because we hadn't waved a magic wand and instantly clicked together? Was I not giving Rex enough of a chance? Was I giving Rex too _much_ of a chance?

This was one of the things that it'd be amazing to talk over with another friend or teacher, get advice and perspective on, but given as most of my urgency came from a source I couldn't talk about, my lips were unfortunately sealed. Obviously, I couldn't talk to _Rex_ about whether or not I should ditch him, he'd be understandably biased on the subject.

I sighed again and slumped even further downwards, dipping under the surface and letting the water close over my head, trying to think as relaxing heat soaked into my whole body.

Everything before Halloween was my grace period. This was when _Not!_ happened, that was when none of the major players were doing or planning or starting anything. Broadly speaking, aside from planning what to do if this ended up being the manga and I had to help save Crona and then figure out an alternative way to seal the Kishin afterwards, I had no goals or things I needed to accomplish. I _could_ kick back and relax, but I had nixed that in favor of training hard, in the hopes that I would be able to power forward alongside Rex and maybe reach EAT sometime close to the beginning of the main series' events.

I could deal with wasted effort, though. Perhaps there was still a chance that this would work out –and I _wanted_ it to work out, for Rex's sake as well as my own. If we hadn't markedly improved by the day of the Death Festival and Shaula's uprising, I'd have to seriously consider looking for another partner. In the meantime, I'd have to try and salvage our relationship however I could.

__

_***Time Skip***_

The ride to the DWMA was awkward, as it had been for the past few days. Rex and I were in a delicate balance of trying to maintain normality and not start anything, but since we both _knew_ that was what we were doing, it cast a heavy weight over our situation. Rex handed me my morning pastry, obviously hoping that he hadn't and wasn't going to do anything to make me groan and roll my eyes wearily again, and I took it with a brittle smile and a mechanical "thank you." We then sat together in dead silence, nibbling on our respective breakfasts, knowing that if either one of us started a conversation it was only in a desperate attempt to fill the silence and help bridge our awkwardness gap.

Uncomfortable didn't even begin to describe it.

I was annoyed with myself for letting things come to this head, but then again, at this point, this wasn't something I knew how to fix, save by shoving right through it, and since I wasn't sure I _wanted_ to, I was left in a confusing mire of my own making. Rex knew I was having second thoughts, and I couldn't lie to him and say I wasn't, and everything was just awkward and frustrating and not something I knew how to deal with. My past relationships had always been very clear-cut: either someone liked me, tolerated me, ignored me, or loathed me, and this was in none of those categories. There was friendship and frustration on both sides of our equation, and I had no idea how to patch us back together again and leave out the mutual frustration and awkward.

We still went through our daily routine, attending classes, taking extra combat lessons after school, practicing on our own after combat lessons, but it was with the stiff sense that this was a routine that we could follow while all but ignoring each other. It didn't fix anything, and it certainly didn't help my decision whether or not to leave Rex behind. I think he knew that, too, or so I read his infrequent, nervous glances in my direction. We were both stuck in a position we didn't know how to get out of –I'd established right at the beginning that I didn't want him sycophanting to me in an oddly desperate effort to stay partners, but his normal attempts at cordial resolution weren't working here. To be fair, neither were mine, but I wasn't nearly as eager to please as Rex was.

This _sucked_.

It sucked and I didn't know how to fix it, and that only added to my frustrations. This was a boiling pot of emotions that was about to start an oil fire in the kitchen, and all we had on hand was water. It was _maddening_ , because I knew if we just _stopped being awkward_ , we could keep working together like we had at the start of our partnership. But we wouldn't stop being awkward until I stopped being silently frustrated about our lack of progress, and that just wasn't going to happen until we made progress, but we _couldn't_ make progress while Rex felt my frustration and cringed over it. It was a vicious, self-defeating loop that I had no idea how to break out of, and canvassing my knowledge of anime tropes and human psychology didn't give me any bright ideas.

We were essentially stuck.

I didn't like being stuck.

In fact, I rather loathed it.

Still, even if there wasn't much I could do to fix it, that didn't mean I was going to stop trying.

"You wanna swing by _42 Icecream_ before we hit the cages?" I asked as Rex and I walked down the steps at the end of the day. "I think we deserve a frozen treat."

Despite how the question was very clearly loaded with _"can we please make this better"_ energy, Rex perked up a little. It was hard not to, in the face of ice cream. Ice cream made everything better.

We were still mostly silent as we rode the bus over and hopped off at our usual stop, but it was a warmer silence than the morning, and I'd take it while I had it. This may only improve our awkward relationship infinestably, but if I threw enough friendly smiles and ice cream at the problem, maybe it would fix itself. A fraction of progress was still progress, and I could and would empty my wallet on dragging us through fraction by fraction until we had healed our awkward uncomfortableness and frustration. Aside from the weekly DWMA allowance, I still had the quite frankly obscene amount of money I'd bet on the cricket games back at Weston, although I'd have to find a suitably discreet location and cast a money-switching spell on it to make the 1889 British pounds actually usable tender.

In any case, despite the friction in our partnership and the looming threat of Medusa and other such undesirables, money was _not_ one of my concerns.

"Soooo…" I said into the quiet as Rex and I strolled down the curving street near the ice cream parlor. "Uh, how long does it normally take for a partnership to really get going at the school?"

This was kinda just bulldozing right on through the awkward, but dancing around the subject when we both knew it was up in the air hadn't helped this past week or so, and I was at the end of my solution-finding rope. Talking it over hadn't helped before either, but you missed every shot you didn't take and all that. At this point, not even directly addressing the subject could make it _worse_.

"Oh!" Rex jumped a little, then tugged on his earring. "Uh, well…it kinda varies, I guess. Sometimes people take a while to find the right partner, sometimes they click right away."

I groaned in the back of my throat, and he flinched. Another sign our tenuous partnership was going south –back at the beginning, he'd just fidget nervously, not assume the worst.

"But like, this is _normal_ , right?" I asked, half-reassuring him and half trying to get the answer to the question that was heaviest on my mind. "I mean, even when you hook up with a good partner, sometimes it just takes a while to get the machine going, doesn't it?"

"Definitely." Rex said with sudden conviction, making me blink. "This is –taking this long to get used to each other is normal. We were strangers a month ago. Building enough trust in our bond to the point where we'll be able to get into EAT is going to take a while. It's perfectly natural to be a little shaky and uncomfortable starting out-"

"You're from the DWMA?"

We both stopped at a hoarse voice from behind us. Too late, I realized that the tangled maze of the DWMA streets meant that someone could pop out behind you or beside you or all around you when you least expected it, if you didn't listen closely for the sound of footsteps on cobblestones. Automatically, my hand jerked down to my hip, where my Colt had been holstered these past few months, but now that I was at the DWMA and had a human Weapon tagging along with me, it had seemed like poor form to go armed –not to mention suspicious. I was regretting that a bit now, though aside from warning shots I'm not sure what I could've done –or dared to do– to another person. 

"Can we help you?" Rex asked politely as he and I both turned to face the speaker, though Rex looked almost as wary as I did.

Our new conversation partner wasn't someone I recognized, though that meant precisely jack shit –it was some dude in his twenties with a nondescript face, haircut, and clothes, the sort of background nobody that'd be manning a counter or standing in a crowd during exposition shots. He seemed a little strange, though, just…standing _oddly_ as he looked intently at Rex, with something off in his posture that I couldn't name but knew was out of whack. I could see that his left pupil was dilated hugely, too, taking up the entirety of his iris so that his eye color was anyone's guess, and as he suddenly jerked around to look at me, his right eye-

Fucking _shit_. His right eye had been overtaken completely, iris and pupil, by a dull maroon color, with a curving indigo blot towards the bottom, like a scorpion's stinger.

This was one of Shaula's poisoned and brainwashed Traitors.

"Did you sleep well last night?" the Traitor asked, standing woodenly as he now regarded both of us as one unit. My eyes flicked down towards his hands, and sure enough, there was a clawlike blade on the tip of his pointer finger.

"Um-" Rex began, but I interrupted him tersely.

"Rex, transform, please."

He did so almost instinctively, though Rex definitely looked like he wanted to protest or at least _process_ what the heck was going on. Still, I was his partner: I demanded and needed him, so it was his job to fulfill that need. He could ask questions in his Weapon form as well as any other, after all, and if I felt threatened, it was his duty to defend me no matter the cost.

Rex's weight as he landed in my hands was somewhat comforting, even if he wasn't my preferred weapon right now, and I held his blade horizontally to my left, tip down towards the ground, edge facing me, ready to swing Rex like a bat if need be.

"We're NOT students." I said, remembering that that had worked for Akane in the manga. "If you want a fight, we're not gonna be much of a challenge, man."

The Traitor didn't say anything. I caught a flash and shimmer on Rex's blade, and a reflection of his face appeared on the flat metal, like it had become a mirror.

"Do you think he hears us?" Rex asked.

"He should. We're standing right here." I said, eyeing the motionless Traitor warily as he continued to stare at us without expression, standing less than ten feet away from us on our deserted side-street. "He's weird enough, I'm sure as hell not getting closer."

What I _meant_ by that was, of course, the fact that the Traitor's finger-blade should be poisoned, probably with the same stuff that made you one of Shaula's puppets, and I was sure as shit not getting close enough to find out the hard way.

This was a bad matchup for us –sure, I might get some mobility and agility _later_ , but for now, Rex and I didn't work together nearly enough for me to feel comfortable fighting someone else in close range. Especially not Traitors –if I remembered correctly, they were zippy little bastards, and the whole "Traitor" designation came not from them being active traitors to any particular organization, but because that was the closest translation to the "dojo destroyer" that was used in the original Japanese, meaning someone who picked fights at such places to prove their worth.

So, a faux martial artist –since the Traitors were usually brainwashed civilians– versus us. It probably wasn't a good sign that I wasn't confident that we'd win.

The rubber of my sneaker scuffed against the sunbaked cobblestones as I slid one foot back without taking my eyes away from the Traitor, making sure I wasn't going to trip up if I moved backwards. I needed room, and if worst came to worst, I wasn't afraid to run for it-

And of course he wouldn't give me that chance.

Almost as soon as I moved, the Traitor lunged forward, clawed hand coming up, and I quickly put all my weight on that back foot, pulling away as I swung the blunt edge of Rex's blade at his center mass. Martial artist or not, he'd need to dodge that one, and I couldn't afford to let him get inside my extensive guard.

The Traitor raised his left arm to block Rex's blow as there was an ugly _crack_ of bone, sliding sideways a few inches as he dug in with his feet, and then darted in with his other hand towards me as we both gaped at him, clawed fingertip gleaming.

_SHIT!_

I resisted the automatic impulse to throw up a magic wall, taking several blind, risky steps backwards as I pulled out of his range and got Rex between us again.

"What the hell was that?!" I panted, continuing to retreat and futilely swipe at him as the Traitor kept lunging at us with quick, jabbing attacks.

"Why'd you break his arm?!" Rex cried to me.

"I didn't _mean_ to-"

I grunted as the Traitor's foot slammed down into my leading one, pinning me in place as the clawed fingertip swept in again. I jerked Rex sideways, shifting to hold him vertically, and the finger-blade skidded and screeched off his metal surface. I suddenly had a brilliant idea –and only seconds to execute it– and palmed the other side of Rex's blade, shoving forward and feeling a satisfying _thud_ of contact as Rex's flat slammed into the Traitor's face. His weight on my foot weakened, and I jerked it backwards, lowering Rex so I could see my opponent again.

Broken arm dangling and a reddening bruise on his forehead, the Traitor stared at us blankly, one eye dilated hugely and the other hidden by swirling colors. I wondered who he'd been before Shaula got her pin-pricking hands on him, and how much trouble he'd get in after this was all over. A trickle of blood suddenly started oozing down his face as we stared at each other, and for a second I thought that maybe the brainwashing had gone wrong somehow, before realizing that Rex and I had just hit him hard enough to break his nose.

"Arya…" Rex said after a moment, seeing everything that I saw. "I think he's had enough. We should let him go."

"I'd love to, but he won't let us." I replied shortly. I took a step to the side, like I was trying to break away through an alley, and the Traitor matched it. "See?"

Rex was silent.

My best bet at this point would be to either knock the Traitor out or hope someone more qualified wandered by, but as it was, I was hesitant to try and use incapacitating force, and I had _never_ been that lucky. Just a semi-casual swing with only enough force to knock the guy off-balance –in my mind, at least– had broken his fucking _arm_ , and I didn't dare to try to swing for his head under those circumstances. This was a normal civilian who had had the misfortune to be bodysnatched and brainwashed, killing him would make me feel sick.

And of course, again, my luck had never been so serendipitous that someone qualified would just randomly wander by right now. That was bullshit. Sure, I was trying to subtly edge backwards to the point where we came out of this deserted side-street and people actually saw us fighting, and therefore could run to a phone and call the DWMA, but I needed to actually _get_ to that point.

My hands shook, and Rex shook with them.

"Okay, maybe we'll have to just break both his legs…" I muttered to myself, and I caught a jolt that didn't come from me.

"What?! That's _horrible_!" Rex gasped. "And we can't –he's not a Kishin Egg!"

"He's also _not stopping_ , and if I crack him over the head with you, I might split his skull open!" I snapped back. "This is our best option. If his legs are broken, he can't come after us, and we can run to a phone and call for help. He can get legs casts and be fine in a few months, which he _won't_ be if I try to knock him out with you!"

"Its not my fault I'm heavy!"

"I never said it was-" I could feel Rex getting heavier in my hands, our discord sinking his blade downwards. "Ugh, just forget about it! We need to focus on fighting him right now!"

Thank god the anime logic of this world meant that opponents would give each other long pauses to either charge up their attacks, exposit, or talk amongst each other. Otherwise I would've had a finger-blade jammed up between my ribs the second Rex started arguing back. As it was, I had time to flick my eyes anxiously around the empty street in the vain hope any witnesses would show up, before the Traitor lunged at me again, hand coming up.

I twisted Rex frantically to block the jabs and swatting attacks, edging ever backwards and desperately hoping I wouldn't trip, because that was almost certainly an automatic lose in this scenario. Even if my progress back towards the main street was measured in half-steps and inches, we were still getting _closer_ , and sooner or later someone would notice what was going on.

Ignoring the sudden leaden weight dragging me down, I swiped Rex at the Traitor's knees, only for him to pull an anime move on me and jump up, landing on the tip of Rex's blade and pinning him to the ground.

_Uh-oh._

I'd seen enough fight scenes to know where this was going, and as the Traitor moved forward to run up his blade, I tucked and dove forward, somersaulting under the Traitor's lunge as Rex's blade scraped against the ground and the Traitor's momentum carried him right past us, stepping off of Rex entirely as I rolled to my feet and whirled back to face him, heart pounding. I'd been prepared every moment for the stinging prick that would mean it was all over, and the fact that the Traitor hadn't managed to jab me in the back during my roll didn't lessen my panic in any way.

We were either outclassed or on level with this guy, and now he was between me and my proposed direction of escape.

This wasn't looking good.

"Hey! Over here!"

I heard the sound of running footsteps, and even though the Traitor's expression didn't change any, he clearly heard them too. I straightened up as he bent his legs and jumped, bracing against several walls as he leapfrogged his way up to the roofs surrounding us, and then with a scamper of feet on tiles, was gone.

Turning towards the sound of people, I saw several students I vaguely recognized from the hallways of the DWMA rushing towards us. They stopped when they realized the Traitor was gone, looking towards us with recognition and vague concern as I opened my hands and Rex twisted back into human existence.

"We got a call about a Traitor fight in this area." the apparent leader announced, panting from their rapid run. "You guys okay?"

"Yeah." I said, flexing my hands a little to get rid of the after-fight adrenaline tingles, tensing and relaxing various muscles as I assessed my lack of damage. The Traitor probably hadn't even bruised my foot when he stamped down on it, and I'd managed to avoid getting pricked. "We're both fine."

The look on Rex's face seemed to indicate he disagreed with me.

__

_***Time Skip***_

We were still arguing on the Deathbus 42 as it carted us back to our respective dorms –thankfully, using it at this time of day meant that we were basically the only ones on the bus, so no one was there to hear our fight.

"I can't believe you wanted to break his legs!" Rex said, looking snippier than I had ever seen him.

"Did you have a better idea?" I shot back, throwing up one hand in exasperation. "Look, I didn't like it either, but _obviously_ I'm not good enough at using your weapon form to have risked knocking him out. It was that or let him walk right over us!"

"Maybe he didn't want to." Rex pointed out. "Maybe he wanted help or something, and you freaked him out when you had me transform!"

"Oh, yeah, and the Witchy eyeball didn't mean _anything_." I sneered, tugging at the skin under my own eye with one finger in demonstration. "Or the fact that he ignored a fucking broken arm! He called us out for being DWMA students, he wouldn't let us try to escape, and he brushed off injuries no normal person would! He was obviously one of those Traitor guys they put up posters for in school. You know, the ones that say they're highly dangerous and we should report 'em or knock 'em out, on account of being under Witch mind control?"

"Then he was a victim!"

"And I wasn't going to let him victimize us!"

Rex made a frustrated sound, glaring at me. "You don't have to attack everything you see as a threat!" he snapped.

"What's _that_ supposed to mean-"

Metal screeched as the whole bus lurched forward, the driver breaking so suddenly that the both of us, who were holding onto overhead straps and standing, stumbled and nearly fell as our satchels, forgotten on the ground, slid forward several feet.

"Girls' dorm!" the driver announced far too loudly, in the sense of _please stop arguing and get off my bus you fucking lunatics_.

I growled out a sigh, reaching down and fishing under the seats for my misplaced satchel.

"Look, Rex," I said as I stood up, slinging mine over my shoulder and handing his back to him by the strap. "We'll talk about this _later_. We're both angry right now and arguing with each other is just going to make it worse. For now, let's just go home and think on things so we can _try_ to salvage our partnership tomorrow."

The sight of his stricken expression filled me with less guilt than it should have, but I _was_ angry right now, angry enough that I'd have liked to slam the bus doors on my way out onto the pavement, but of course that was something beyond my control.

The bus pulled away with another hiss and screech of brakes, and I stalked angrily across the inner courtyard of the dorm, slamming the large front door behind me, at least, and stomping up the steps in the kind of irritable bad temper that was all the worse for having no one to be specifically angry at. Rex? He'd made some valid points. Me? I'd done what I had to.

My roommate training was too strong for me to slam our door too, which was good, since Ao was drowsing on top of her bed with a magazine laid out before her. I was then left to throw myself into the chair for my writing desk and fume, plonking my bookbag satchel down beside my chair and seething aimlessly. I wanted to go out and hit things at the batting cages, but that would just make me feel worse, because either I'd have to go with Rex and our shared resentment would ruin any attempt at catharsis, or I'd go by myself and feel even worse for doing something that was essentially behind his back.

Gah. This sucked.

Maybe I'd could ask the school psychologist what to do tomorrow…I mean, interpersonal relationships was something he'd know about, right? Maybe he could tell me how to fix this mess. I reached down and under the flap of my bookbag to grab my journal and make a note of it, only to freeze.

My journal wasn't in my bag.

Heedless of waking Ao up, I yanked the satchel up into my lap and violently ripped the flap open, staring at the contents wordlessly as my heart fell all the way down through my feet. Papers, folders, a familiar pencil case, but no journal. There _was_ a glasses case, and what looked like a cleaning kit, and a storage clip of the red barrettes that Rex used to pin back that one side of his bangs.

This wasn't my satchel.

Our bags must've gotten switched on the bus. _Rex_ had my satchel now.

Fucking _shit_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: January 4th, 2021, 5.31 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: January 4th, 2021, 5.28 PM USA Central Time


	10. Zodiac: Leo

_Arya's POV:_

With all the fuss and bother that we'd had to do with reporting the attack before heading home, Rex and I hadn't gotten on the Deathbus until evening, so night had well and truly fallen by the time I tumbled back out of another bus on the same line, panting with my hands on my knees for a few seconds in front of the boys' dorm while it pulled away. The streets were completely deserted, with the only signs of life being streetlamps –lit with electrified candles, which was an interesting way of going about maintaining an aesthetic– and some lights in the buildings around the dorm. Oh, and the dorm itself, of course: plenty of guys still had their lights on.

The dark street was a very picturesque scene for a potential murder, and/or average scenario. Kinda depended on how we both played this, I guess.

There was every chance that Rex hadn't noticed the satchel switch, and even if he had, there was no reason at all for him to go snooping around in my journal. I'd stopped by Misery's rooms to make sure she called the boys' dorm and said I wanted to see Rex before I'd booked it over here, so if he _had_ noticed the switch, his own dorm supervisor would've stopped him from rushing out to try and return my bag to me. All that remained was to get my stuff back, and hopefully forget this whole thing had ever happened, not to mention keep a better guard on my effects in the future.

I wasn't sure what the hell I was going to do if he _had_ opened up my journal. While the beginning third or so mostly fulfilled its purpose as something for me to confide my thoughts in, the rest of it was a mass of very clearly arcane scribbles and notes in languages Rex didn't know. It was hard to imagine an innocent explanation for that, at least in the context of this world.

Still, nothing gained by standing here with his bag over my shoulder. I straightened up again, marching firmly up to the front door –which was, indeed, decidedly less glamorous than ours– and opening it.

Rex was standing on the other side, arms folded. I blinked in surprise, before my eyes tracked downwards, seeing that he had my bag slung over his shoulder as well.

"Uh, so we had a bit of a mix-up on the bus." I said as a beginning, offering him a tentative smile. I bounced the satchel off my shoulder and held it out to him by the strap. "So…switchies?"

It was hard to read his expression, especially after the argument we'd just had. Was he mad at me because we'd been yelling at each other and then I essentially showed up to demand something of him? Was he jumpy because of what I had said about maybe switching off to a different partner? Was he scared because he'd opened my journal and pegged me for a Witch?

The shadows in his eyes were a gulf of ambiguity, and one that didn't bode well regardless of their specific meaning.

Rex unfolded his arms and reached out, taking his satchel back almost gingerly as he handed me mine in turn. Hypersensitive to the nuances of my reclaimed property, I realized that my bag was suspiciously _lighter_ , with a certain absence of a rectangular weight inside it.

"Dude, did you take my book?"

Rex's eyes darted away from me. His fingers tightened on the straps of his bag, and his free hand slowly crept up to his piercing as I began to sweat. Bad, _bad_ sign.

"M-maybe we should have this conversation away from the dorm." Rex said with a noticeable gulp.

_Aw, hells bells._

I looked around the boys' dorm courtyard, then grabbed Rex as he made a highly alarmed noise, dragging him down towards an ornamental pond and ramshackle gazebo nearby. Hopefully, the gazebo would hide us from any onlookers, and the water would guarantee the absence of any spiders or snakes that the Gorgon sisters could use to spy on us. It wasn't perfect, but for the sake of secrecy, I could make do.

"Alright," I said as I dumped him on the far side of the gazebo, the both of us hidden between it and the wall. "Talk."

Rex straightened, nervously grasping the wrist I had dragged him by, like he was afraid I'd infected him by touch or something.

"The stuff in that book –that's your handwriting." he said tremulously. "You're writing about magic and magic theories like you _know_ it."

I debated lying, saying it was for a school project or a personal project or some shit like that. Rex probably wouldn't believe me, though: what little research I had managed to accomplish over these past few weeks had told me that, surprise surprise, magical manuscripts to the level I was writing at weren't publicly available. Even if Witches and Sorcerers had inborn magic, apparently the knowledge of how to use it, or even the most basic formulas, were closely guarded by both them and the academy, who were the only ones with access to such materials. And Rex was _in_ class with me, so he knew that what I was writing about wouldn't be homework.

"Why'd you go peeking through my diary, dude?" I asked, folding my arms and rather guiltily trying to guilt-trip him out of whatever he was building up steam for.

"I threw what I thought was my bag at the wall, and it fell out and then fell open when it hit the ground." Rex said, looking both defensive and terrified all at once, like he was trying to explain himself for even accidentally looking at someone else's private property while it also happened to reveal them as a huge criminal.

Ah. Well, that would do it –and at least he hadn't gone paging through my stuff on _purpose_.

"Wait, nobody else saw that, right?!" I asked, a sudden spike of alarm rushing through me as I realized that Rex, like me, probably had at least one roommate. To my unmitigated relief, though, Rex shook his head.

"No, I was alone." he said, then blinked and took a step away from me. "B-but I told my roommate I'd be meeting with you right now, and to expect me back in an hour, so don't- don't _try_ anything!"

"What, like murder you and ransack your room to get my book back?" I asked sardonically, raising one eyebrow, before promptly regretting that statement as Rex turned dead white. "Dude, I'm _joking_."

"You're a _Witch_!" Rex hissed in rebuttal, eyes frantic, and I flinched and looked around, automatically trying to make sure nobody was within hearing distance.

"Dude, shut up!" I hissed back. "Or I _will_ wring your neck!"

Rex took another step back, looking even more alarmed. I was beginning to regret my penchant for verbal hyperbole.

"Okay, look," I snapped, holding up both hands and taking a backwards step of my own. "I'm not gonna –I'm not gonna hurt you or anything, let's just talk this out. You found out I had…stuff, in my journal, but you still waited at the dorms and came out here when I showed up. Why? Shouldn't you be trying to clap me in chains or something?"

Rex swallowed hard, tentatively stepping back to his prior position, mostly hidden from the building by the gazebo.

"I wanted to see if you'd deny it." he muttered, looking at the ground.

"You wouldn't believe me if I did, so why bother?" I said with a deceptively nonchalant shrug, folding my arms across my chest and shifting to stand hipshot. Heck, he wouldn't even believe me if I had told him the _truth_ , so my best bet right now was to let him play out his line and _then_ figure out what to do. "So no, no denials here. What's your game now?"

He tugged at his piercing and looked away, feet shifting in place like he badly _wanted_ to move, but was frozen to the spot.

"I…" Rex began hesitantly, then stopped. He bit his lip, conflict whisking across his features.

I raised an expectant eyebrow.

"Stay my partner!" Rex finally blurted as he jerked his head over to look at me again, face red. I blinked.

Then I blinked again.

"What." I asked blankly.

Rex swallowed hard, his grey eyes darting everywhere nervously, before locking on my face. "S-stay my partner…and I won't turn you in." he stammered after a moment.

_What._

For all he knew I was a Witch, what the _fuck_ was he doing with this "I won't turn you in" bullshit? I could be here making plans to blow up the school and turn the skulls of every student in into my blood-filled shotglasses. He was taking a _huge_ risk by letting me continue to operate unseen. Heck, this was the sort of thing that could get him pegged as an accessory for genocide or a traitor to the school, with all the criminal punishments that that entailed.

Shit, had I accidentally shacked up with a plant of Arachne's or something?

I pulled a hand down my face.

"Dude, you do realize how creepy _"stay in a relationship with me or else"_ sounds?" I groaned into my palm, unable to process just what the hell kind of situation I had gotten myself into and defaulting, therefore, into incredulity over his stupid demands and how they had been voiced.

Rex made a panicked noise.

"O-or at least stay my partner until, uh, you can find me a better one!" he said desperately. "You're a Witch, right, you can-"

He made a vague motion with both hands.

"-do, uh, fortune…telly…stuff with magic."

"You mean divination?" I asked wearily.

"Yeah! That!" Rex said, face lighting up with a painful kind of hope. "You can find me the right partner! You know, someone who really is compatible and I can go to EAT with."

"And you're willing to let me fly under the radar…for that?" I said with deep disgust. "Dude, how fucking important is one damn _partnership_ to you?"

Rex's expression twisted a little. "You wouldn't get it." he muttered sullenly.

"Try me. Your parents gonna disown your or something if you don't have one?"

Rex's nonplussed blink told me that I'd missed the mark on that one.

"Ugh, anyways. You really think this is going to work?" I asked him, trying to appeal to some kind of rationality here. "Me trying to wield you for practice and stuff is hard enough already, it isn't going to happen if you're _scared_ of me –and don't lie to my face right now and say that you aren't. This is stupid. It's a stupid idea, but no one's gotten hurt here, so you can just…give me my journal back, and we can both forget this ever happened."

"And then you'll stop being my partner tomorrow." Rex said, folding his arms and scowling stubbornly at me. I couldn't deny it.

"So you're okay with a hollow relationship forged by blackmail with someone that can tear you apart for threatening her, _just as long_ as you have a registered partner on the DWMA roster." I groaned in exasperation, pinching my nose. Rex didn't deny it, either. "Jesus Christ, man, what the fuck is up with you."

"You wouldn't get it." Rex repeated, a nervous glint entering his eyes. "I won't tell anyone if you stay my partner until we find a better one for me, a-and then…I'll give your journal back, and I won't tell anyone that you're a Witch afterwards, either."

Hmm. Bull and shit, but there wasn't really anything I could do about that right now.

"You know what? Fuck it. _Fine_." I said, lifting both hands sharply in a gesture of defeat. "Deal. Keep my journal away from spiders, snakes, and the school nurse until we fix this whole partner thing, and I won't slow-roast you over an open flame."

Rex blinked.

"What?"

"I mean, all school staff, really, but especially the nurse."

"Why the nurse?"

"Because I said so and it's in your best interests to keep me as happy as possible right now. There's only so many places you could've hidden my book before I got here." I snapped, scowling at him and raising a threatening fist. Rex backed down sharpish.

"Sorry."

"You're blackmailing me and you say _sorry_." I muttered under my breath. "You're a real piece of work, Rex, you know that?"

He shuffled guiltily.

"Ugh, anyways. See you tomorrow, _partner_." I said, putting sardonic emphasis on the last word as he winced. "Better keep my journal safe."

I grumpily stalked past him without another word, heading out onto the road. I paused at the gate and looked back, seeing that Rex had hurried back to the dorm and was now hyperventilating inside, possibly without even realizing that I could see him through the window.

Eh, good to know I wasn't the only person regretting every decision I'd ever made in the past ten minutes.

__

_***Time Skip***_

If our bus rides had been awkward before, then the piercing, deafening silence as Rex and I rode to school the next day took the cake. He handed me a wrapped, prepacked pastry –obviously worried that I'd think he might poison me or something– and otherwise didn't so much as look at me throughout the entire rest of the ride, while I placidly did the same.

Okay, maybe I was pissed beyond belief that I had managed to _lose my journal_ within a mere month of showing up here –and not even to one of the big bads, but to this dweeby nobody– but on the other hand…this wasn't nearly the threat that he thought of it as. I wasn't _actually_ a Witch, ergo I'd have some wiggle room if and when I ever actually got charged for this. My main concern was if his hiding place somehow got sniffed out by Medusa, who could then read out all my notes –thankfully, I had already ripped out all of the important stuff in regards to my notes on the characters and plot, but there was still a lot of magical theorization and formulas in there, and that was probably all it'd take for everything to come crashing down. Magic here had rules, and my magic didn't conform to those rules. She'd be suspicious.

And a suspicious Medusa was absolutely the _last_ thing I needed, in any case, ever.

So Rex was in an odd position of both "no threat" and "severe threat," which beyond any awkwardness and lingering resentment from the fact that we had _had_ an argument the day before, meant that I was pretty much at a loss for how to talk to him. Not to mention the fact that he looked like he might fall over in a dead faint if I so much as sneezed at him, too –Rex was obviously prepared for some kind of violent and swift retribution, which made the fact that he was still actually going through with all this rather odd.

Honestly, I'd given up understanding this guy. He was meek and eager to please, but he also had the balls –or desperation– to blackmail a Witch, and not only that, blackmail me into a situation that honestly had little to no benefit for him. Remaining officially as his partner, even when we were obviously at odds? What good did that do? It was like putting a bandaid over a broken pipe.

Whatever. I had other stuff to focus on –mainly, getting Rex another partner before Halloween. How to go about that, though? Rex had either conveniently forgotten or didn't know about the whole "some meisters can sense Witches" thing. I remembered that Maka had initially been surprised that Stein could see the soul –and its characteristics– of someone who was still alive, saying that that was a skill reserved for the most talented of meisters, and she also hadn't had a clue what a Witch's Soul Protect was, or how it worked, when initially meeting a disguised Medusa. Maka was a dedicated student and inveterate bookworm, too, so what she _didn't_ know probably couldn't be common knowledge.

I didn't have a Soul Protect, but then again, I also wasn't technically a Witch, so it was easily plausible that my soul didn't ping on anybody's radar, and equally plausible that I _wouldn't_ catch anyone's attention unless I actually used magic. It was just barely possible that my magic was alien enough that even when using it, my soul wouldn't flare up with telltale traces of the arcane, but that was a risk I wasn't willing to take.

Anyways, I was essentially unprotected to the prying metaphorical eyes of someone's Soul Perception, and therefore I was leery of doing anything that would increase my phasmological footprint. From past experience, I knew the fact that I _was_ a magic-user left an unspecified mark on my soul, something that meant demons and Grim Reapers (of a different strain than Lord Death) could peg me on sight as a magician. Magical creatures responded to it, too, that mark or difference in my aura that meant I wielded magical energies in a certain way and was therefore a human worth avoiding, cozening, or attacking.

So even without the benefits of a Soul Perception of my own or a sudden hysterical accusation from another student, I knew that my soul _had_ magic, or was visibly tied to magic in some way. I just didn't know if it'd be something the people here would recognize, since the laws of physics and everything else as I understood it had been twisted so very much out of whack. For all I knew, it was something too subtle to catch unless you were inhuman or a magic-user yourself, or the signs were plastered all over me, but also illegible.

Heck, it was possible that my soul didn't _work_ like the souls here –I mean, with the glowing sphere around my body and the little chibified face and all that. I didn't know what my soul was supposed to look like normally, and I was _not_ adding metaphysical/phasmological studies to my already-lengthy list of things to look up and try to understand before I got out of here. At this point, unless someone grabbed and started shaking me with screams of _"Why don't you have a proper soul,"_ I was ignoring that and all my other problems and focusing on one thing at a time. I could afford to do that, this was my grace period.

Unfortunately, my grace period now looked to be taken up by finding a new partner for Rex. Even outside of my lack-of-divination problems, I wasn't sure how to go about it. All the whispers and giggles seemed pretty indicative of the fact that nobody who'd been with the NOT class for a while would want to partner up with Rex, not to mention the fact that, you know, he hadn't gotten a partner from that group in all the five years he'd been here.

So…I was limited to my fellow new students, which presented a unique number of challenges and benefits. On the one hand, they weren't subject to whatever gossipy nonsense the older NOT students were immersed in, but on the other hand, I would essentially be picking blind, since I obviously had no way to assess these people's personalities _accurately_ enough to feel comfortable with pointing Rex in their direction and saying "Go nuts."

He wanted to go to EAT, after all, which meant that he needed a partner capable of fighting, which automatically ruled out a wide swath of the NOT students, who were just here to control their Weapon powers and go home, or attending the DWMA for that sweet sweet social clout. I needed to find someone who was capable of wielding something as unwieldy as Rex's buster sword form, and someone who would click and bond with his soul to the point of being worthy of a Resonance. I also needed to find someone who could put up with Rex's tendency for hasty apologies and nervous fidgeting, not to mention do _all_ of this covertly, as people would have some pretty sharp things to say if they caught me "cheating" on Rex, since we were ostensibly still in a working partnership.

No pressure.

Still, I set to it, because the sooner I could get all of this out of the way, the sooner I could focus on doing _my_ thing, aka getting back home and training to cockblock Medusa at all possible turns. One thing I could definitely do without arousing any suspicion at all was watch the other students, trying to study their visible personalities and see how, with my meta knowledge of anime tropes, any of them might be of help clicking with Rex.

There were some familiar faces as we spun throughout the day –I saw Anya, Tsugumi, and Meme a few times, and after dubious consideration, added either Anya or Meme to the list of possible candidates. After all, Tsugumi was the center of a two-person meister group, and at least, as canon characters, I _did_ know their personalities…though that wasn't exactly helpful.

Anya was a classical anime priss, all blonde hair and European nobility, and her most dominant character trait was the fact she was a tsundere. Her cold and haughty exterior would put Rex into a panic nearly every damn day of the week, and though I might be feeling vindictive towards him right now, I wasn't _that_ cruel.

Meme, on the other hand, was skilled, a good fighter, and had a supportive and upbeat demeanor, but I wasn't sure if she actually _wanted_ to move to EAT, ever, and that was a bit of a problem. Also, I needed to leave either her or Anya with Tsugumi, and to be brutally honest, I didn't like considering the idea of breaking their friendship up solely for my benefit.

I suppose Ao might do…but she was low on the list for the same reason. Ao seemed content to be in NOT, and that automatically disqualified her.

To my surprise, given as I distinctly remembered her fighting with the other EAT students during the battle for BREW, Kim Diehl was in our NOT science class and without her partner Jacqueline. I mean, their shenanigans while hooking up had formed a lot of the subplot of _Not!_ , but I could've sworn that that was all resolved by now. Well, at least her presence here meant that advancement to EAT was easily possible once you found the right partner…

I just had to find the damn partner.

Science class, as we continued working on our unit about explosives, reminded me of Stein, and for a moment I was seized with terrible, evil temptation. Stein was the best meister to have ever graduated from the academy at this point. He was a Genius-category meister, someone who could pick up any Weapon he cared to and master them instantly. True, he had _graduated_ , but he was an extremely skilled teacher despite his eccentricities, and would probably have no problem whipping Rex into shape. I could point Rex in his direction, and Stein would excise all of Rex's insecurities and weaknesses like he was cutting them out of my partner with a scalpel, then wave Rex back to the DWMA in a newly-competent frame of mind.

Two things stopped me.

One, Stein's eccentricities included treating everyone around him as a potential lab rat, and he'd experimented on his own partner while said partner was asleep for _years_ before Maka's mother had caught him. Granted, Spirit was dumb enough not to notice anything strange "aside" from the fact that new scars appeared on his body every night, but Rex's weird tendency to over-serve his partners might mean he'd notice and just not _say_ anything, and I didn't feel comfortable with shoving Rex into that situation.

Two, Stein was insatiably curious and I had no doubt that, if Rex took him as a mentor, Stein would wrangle the secret of my Witchiness out of Rex sooner or later, with an emphasis on sooner. Stein's Soul Perception was acute enough that he could almost read minds, when he cared to, and he was hypersensitive to social cues. He'd notice that Rex was jumpy around me and secretive about why, and then that curiosity would be aroused and Stein would not rest until he pried the reasons out of Rex. And then, in all probability, I'd wake up on his lab table with Stein creaking and twisting the screw through his head above me.

Pity. Shoving Rex at Stein would solve so many problems, if I just turned off my pesky sense of ethics and safety.

Anyways, looking at the other students, I could vaguely pick out personality types. Normally, judging people like this would be a ridiculous exercise of prejudice and stereotyping, but this _was_ an anime, and more than that, a _shouen_ one full of the cliches of its class. Twin-tailed, underdeveloped Maka was the bookworm, spiky-haired Blackstar was the loudmouth, buxom short-haired Patty was the childishly manic girl, the formally-dressed Kid was an uptight perfectionist, and so on. Technically, I wasn't being judgy so much as I was identifying the stereotypes the _author_ had deemed fit to create for this world. And anyways, this was an initial personality scan to guide my decision-making _later_.

I skipped out on the girls with twin braids, as they were usually the _deredere_ type, and thus eternally cheerful and upbeat, but weak or even shy when it came to fighting. The girls with shorter hair and tight abbreviated shirts or sloppy uniforms were probably the spunky sports girl type –I wasn't sure if there was a - _dere_ term for that, but I definitely knew the trope– and they might be worth some serious inspection later. They were generally rough but kind, and Rex definitely needed someone to steer him and keep him grounded. Plus, being a sports-type person at a combat school practically guaranteed that they'd be down for going to EAT.

Guys were kinda harder to tell, since a lot of the anime personality seemed to be stored in the hair or chest size for girls –both less applicable to guys, who generally had the same three hairstyles in different colors and obviously didn't have much in the way of cleavage going on. The larger, more muscly guys with short-cropped hair I automatically crossed off my list, since they were usually bullies. The kids with flashy clothing and even more jewelry than Rex I also crossed off, since they were probably stuck in that horrific _chuunibyou_ phase of life, aka Middle School Syndrome. The guys with prominently spiked hair in weird colors I cautiously put in my mental "maybe" file, since they'd probably be loud and boisterous and involved in combative activities.

Alas, it was hard to pick people out of the NOT class, since most of us had very Plain-Jane features, with brown hair and eyes and all sorts of other dull colors that meant easy animation and lack of prominence in group shots. Only main characters got the kind of vibrant colors and extra accessories that formed a personality, though that rule was mitigated somewhat by a lot of these kids being, you know, _real_ and not cartoon slaves to an animation company's budget. Still…despite my best efforts, there just wasn't as much personality on display with us as there was for the canon cast that I spotted throughout the day.

Accursed anime tropes. Why couldn't they be _helpful_ , for once?

_center >***Time Skip***_

Since Rex now had my journal, I had to make my notes on some loose sheets of paper at my desk after Ao and I came back from school, and even then, I had to start on my list _after_ I finished the worksheet about various kinds of incendiary chemicals, a short study guide on the Arthurian Wars (which were apparently a real thing in this world?), and read a chapter in our Social Studies textbook.

Alas, for the school life and the fact that I couldn't magically finish my homework the way I had back at Weston.

`Criteria:`

`Partner must be able and willing to get to EAT.  
Partner must be willing to work with Rex.  
Partner must not be the type to walk all over him.`

`Obstacles:`

`Older NOT students have some kind of gossip-circle going on about Rex. All probably inapplicable.  
Cannot set up flyers or blatantly poke around without inviting questions.  
Cannot use special abilities to find partner.  
Cannot find or introduce new partner before thinking of way to reacquire my journal, as Rex probably won't give it back like he said he would.  
Have to find a way to keep Rex quiet about my journal afterwards.`

`Ideas:`

`I could maybe keep scanning for visible personality facets, then look up the DWMA student files or get to know said students, then maybe introduce Rex and push them together?  
Talk to the school therapist and ask about partnerships?  
Ask Rex about his ideal partner? (Prepare for awkward on that one.)  
Call Britain and ask him for help?!`

I groaned into my palm as I looked at the list. A depressingly large amount of my "ideas" were just me asking someone else for help, and even though I was realistic enough to know that at this point, I really _needed_ help, I still had some withered sprigs of pride that insisted I should be smart enough to figure this out on my own. I'd done so much already, and I'd gotten used to my independence back in _Black Butler_ , where my nearest and only point of support was either a demon-wielding child or my mentor from another world, whom I could only contact in the direst of emergencies.

Whatever. I'd get through this. I'd come to far to back out now just because of weird social entanglements.

Now all I had to do was get through these next few days or weeks with Rex by my side…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: January 15th, 2021, 2.59 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: January 15th, 2021, 2.58 PM USA Central Time


	11. Zodiac: Virgo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mentioned this in the last fic, but since I never specify WHERE in Virginia Arya’s from, her accent could be either Appalachian or Southern. Since my accent’s Upper Midwestern, I don’t have the local experience to specify or write either way, so I tend to leave her accent kind of vague. The fic’s told largely from her perspective anyways, and she of course wouldn’t notice her own accent, so I just settle for infrequent reminders of the fact that Yes, Arya Has a Southern-esque American Accent.

_Arya's POV:_

"Rex, Arya? I need to talk to you."

Rex and I both froze midstride on our way out of the dancing room. Sid had been overseeing our combat practice today, and now he was waving us both over to a corner of the room as the rest of the class filed out.

That couldn't be good.

Rex and I exchanged tense glances, both asking with our eyes if the other had done something to upset our whisper-thin status quo, before turning and shuffling in the manner of reluctant students everywhere over to Sid. His eyes flicked over to the door, waiting for everyone else (even the other instructor) to leave, before he regarded us both.

"Is there something you need two to tell me?" Sid asked, folding his arms across his chest. I was heavily tempted to step on Rex's toe to remind him that no he did _not_ , but I knew Sid would catch the movement.

"Uh, no?" I tried instead, raising one eyebrow. "Unless you mean like what we did with the Traitor earlier this week."

"Maybe." Sid's level expression didn't change. "The two of you haven't been fighting well lately. The instructor of this class asked me to come have a lot, and I've noticed that your Wavelengths have fallen out of sync."

Ah… _that's_ what this was about.

"I-its really not that bad, sir…" Rex said, and without even looking at him I knew he was anxiously tugging at his stud earring.

"Rex, you're tense around your partner." Sid said bluntly. "Your blade is heavier, you're not working with her, and she's having a harder time of dragging you around because of that. And if both me _and_ your instructor can notice this, you can bet she can too. Arya, if you've done something to upset him, you should apologize. Rex should move like an extension of your body, not like he's afraid to let you pick him up."

 _Fat chance of that_. I thought, resisting the urge to snort.

Perversely, despite the fact that he was the one who had dirt to ruin _my_ life hanging ominously over _my_ head, Rex was the more scared of us two. On my end, him exposing me to Lord Death only had the _chance_ to go horribly wrong –there was a decent possibility that it would actually help me. But of course, I wasn't going to gamble my life and/or freedom on a "maybe", which was why I had actually complied to this whole blackmail threat to begin with.

Rex, though? In his eyes, he was blackmailing a _Witch_. He was actually, actively threatening one of the most dangerous members of society. There was every chance that, after this was over, I would flay him alive or something for daring to threaten me and steal my magic book. Rex probably had a million different regrets for pulling that little stunt, but at this point, he was _committed_.

He couldn't exactly hand over a grimoire to a Witch with a sheepish smile and a few words of apology, after all –and he couldn't hold up his end of the bargain even if I actually _did_ find him a good partner, either, because that was letting go of what might be the only thing that kept me from dragging him out of the school and setting his grisly remains up on a pike on the walls or something. Or maybe just torturing him –I wasn't sure of the exact details, only that retaliation from a Witch (from my meta experience and from current reactions) was supposed to be both gruesome and nasty. In his eyes, no matter which way this swung, Rex would be lucky to get out of it alive. His only way out was through.

I was the one being fucking _blackmailed_ , and yet I somehow still felt like the bully in this scenario.

"The two of you fought well together against that Traitor." Sid continued, his voice warming a little as he switched gears in his lecture. "There aren't many NOT teams as new as the two of you that can fight against an enemy of that caliber and come out unharmed. But something's changed between now and then, and the two of you need to figure out what it is and deal with it. Otherwise, you'll have to find new partners."

To my surprise –since Rex had avoided getting within six inches of me for the past few days if he could help it at all– Rex suddenly wrapped both arms around mine, like he was clinging to a teddy bear.

"W-we'll be fine." he blurted. "We're just- it was our first real combat scenario, and we're both a bit tense."

Sid's eyes slid over to me, and I pasted a weak smile on my face.

"Uh, yeah. I didn't really expect to hit the guy as hard as I did, and I've sorta been walking on eggshells with Rex ever since." I agreed. "I don't want to swing him too hard and hurt someone like that again unless I _mean_ to."

Sid relaxed, and I felt Rex's grip correspondingly loosen on my arm. That was a weird bit of subtext between them –Sid definitely wasn't the type of guy who'd force a student to do anything they didn't want to do, but I got the impression during this conversation that somehow, _he_ was a controlling factor in Rex's desperation to have and keep a partner. Why? Rex obviously looked up to him, but so far as I knew, both Rex's parents were alive and supportive, or at least not so abusive that Rex or someone else had mentioned it, and I had a feeling our school therapist would've told me to tread carefully in that direction, much as he had told Rex to watch out for signs of PTSD-based paranoia in me.

In any case, Sid wasn't his surrogate father, and he wasn't the sort of person who would demand that Rex fit the mode of the school, so why was Rex so tense around the idea that Sid, specifically, was questioning the strength of our partnership?

Yet another notch in the ineffable mystery of Rex's partnership status. I swear, if I hadn't been sharing the room with Ao, I'd have made a string-and-posterboard diagram about this whole intricate bullshit ages ago.

"You two look after each other." Sid said, breaking me out of my thoughts as he smiled at both of us. "There's a lot going on with those Traitors that we still don't know about, and we don't know if you might become targets again."

I hummed affirmation, Rex let go of me, and we both exited the conversation gracefully as Sid waved us off and started cleaning up. Once we were outside of the classroom and Sid's direct line of sight, Rex skipped a little sideways, increasing the distance between us, and I rolled my eyes as we kept walking down the confusingly blank corridors.

"Dude, I'm not gonna tear your heart out at any second. Chill."

Rex flinched, cutting his eyes over to me, and looked like he _wanted_ to reply, but didn't dare to. That made sense –any retort he had was probably along the lines of "You're a Witch and I can't trust you," and to give him credit, Rex _was_ keeping my secret as best he could. Announcing my Witchy status in the middle of the DWMA was not in line with that.

"You going to the Death Festival?" I asked, catching sight of a poster as we turned the corner. "That's only in a few weeks, right?"

It was only in a few weeks, and every day that crept by without me coming up with a new partner for Rex twisted the knot of anxiety in my stomach even tighter.

"I…" Rex adjusted his tie nervously. "I guess? What are you doing?"

I made a noncommittal noise. Honestly, I was ready to do just about anything to avoid the sudden upsurge of Traitors due to Shaula's attack, and since she'd be focusing on the combatants in the Festival, it made sense to avoid it. Granted, I didn't have anything _else_ to do, and I wasn't making progress on any of my plans –not even my meta ones, because right now I was focusing on disentangling this situation with Rex before I committed to the long, cold game of logic between me and Medusa. Or my homework in reading up on the snippets of research Britain sent me every Friday. Or the building of my world-sigil for this universe.

I had a lot of plans that weren't going anywhere because of this _one problem_ that I persistently couldn't solve, and that made me grumpy.

"It's the biggest event of the year, right?" I asked after a second. "With the tournament and everything."

Rex nodded.

"The winner gets to meet Lord Death in person, so the competition is pretty fierce." he said, and I tensed, then looked over at him and stepped slightly closer. I didn't go so far as to sling my arm over his shoulders, because I was pretty sure Rex would assume I was about to break his neck, but I did very carefully and deliberately clasp his shoulder.

"Okay, so I know we're on the outs right now 'cause of… _mmm_." I paused and hummed significantly. "But hear me out…what if we entered the competition?"

Rex gave me a flat look.

"Its EATs only." he said. "And I'm _not_ letting you get anywhere close to Lord Death,"

Oh. Right. I'd forgotten about the EAT-only bit.

I sighed and took my hand off his shoulder, stepping away again as I shook my head.

"Never mind then. I'll just get dressed up and go trick-or-treating, I guess."

From what I remembered, a lot of those sorts of festivities started during the day here in Death City, which would be rather odd. Still, maybe getting dressed up and swiping some candy would make me feel better about the maelstrom of problems circling around me right now. Like ice cream, candy had a tendency to make the whole world seem alright again, if only for a minute or so. And besides, with all the chaos when Shaula made her move, I could probably get away with using magic to defend myself from her brainwashed minions if I had to.

I fucking _deserved_ a treat at this point.

Rex looked anxious –he probably didn't want me out of his sight while the Festival went down, but he couldn't exactly tag along with, since we both knew that'd be a blatant effort to stop me from causing any mischief. Not that I _intended_ any mischief, but by Rex's perspective, I was one diabolical hand-rub away from starting a massacre, or sowing the seeds thereof. He couldn't afford to let me roam free, since any evil I caused at this point was, indirectly, his fault.

Which again, like wiggling at a loose tooth with my tongue, had me going back to _why_ he was so very desperate to keep me, specifically, as his partner, and to have a partner by extension. It just didn't make sense. Going by the idea of me being a Witch, Rex was trying to lasso a hurricane here –which I might understand if he had some kind of grand dreams to wipe out all the Kishin Eggs in the world or put himself at the top of the school, but he _didn't_. In exchange for keeping my valuable secret, a secret that could potentially get him expelled for knowing and not reporting, he wanted me to not officially cancel our partnership until I found him a new, better meister. That was the sum total of his benefits for this piece of blackmail, and it didn't make a lick of sense that he was willing to risk his life _and_ potentially the lives of other people for _that_. It was like entering a Faustian bargain for a piece of candy: the risks outpaced the rewards by such a wide margin, it was pathetic.

So why? What was his deal, here?

It bothered me more than I liked to admit that even with my meta knowledge, I just didn't _know_. Rex's past history with his partner was school-wide knowledge, apparently, from faculty all the way down to his classmates, so it couldn't be that he was some kind of spy or plant that was used to dealing with Witches. He wasn't abused, he wasn't an abuser –his horrified flinch when I'd pointed out that side of this bargain made it clear that he hadn't even _realized_ the undertones– and he certainly hadn't been in a situation where his meister might've died. This went too deep and too neurotic for it to have been a partnership that turned into a romance and then ended badly, and I couldn't think of any other reason for this behavior no matter how much I twisted my brain.

It was getting to the point that I was seriously considering saying "fuck it" and just straight-up _kidnapping_ Rex to somewhere out in the desert some night, before tying him down to a chair and getting the truth out of him. While I wasn't even going to consider actual _torture_ , the Witch reputation I was dragging around would probably make Rex start talking the second I brandished anything even vaguely threatening at him. I could threaten to give him cuddles with my cat Squish and he'd probably start sobbing, certain I was about to drown him in the middle of the desert with a watery familiar.

But that was a last resort. Definitely a last resort.

I'd considered wiping his memory, because I was pretty sure I could _probably_ at least fuzz up his memories of the past few weeks enough for him to forget I was a Witch, but memory-magic as I had learned it was a tricky, delicate business, and even though our tentative friendship was basically an ashen husk at this point, I still didn't want to lobotomize the guy. Not to mention that I could only blur out general details, and if "the location of Arya's notebook" was in any way connected to "Arya is a Witch" (which it almost certainly _was_ ), Rex would also forget where he'd hidden my journal, and that obviously caused more problems than it solved.

This was a fun fucking deadlock I'd found myself in.

Still, the thought of sweets and treats reminded me of something.

"We're going to _42 Icecream_." I announced as Rex and I walked down the stairs, and Rex blinked.

"Uh…why?"

"Its my birthday, and I deserve a treat from my _partner_." I said, and Rex blinked again, hurrying a little to catch up to me as he came even, looking at me with a certain amount of skepticism.

"Is it _really_ your birthday, or is this some weird plot?" he asked, and I pulled out my ID card and flashed it at him. Apparently, the nine digits under my picture and name included my birthday in the last four, although they didn't give the year.

 _1017_.

It was, indeed, October 17th.

Rex conceded defeat with a sigh, turning away as I replaced my card in my wallet and my wallet in my pocket.

"Don't they not age? What's the point of celebrating?" Rex asked as we continued walking down the steps, neatly avoiding any mention of Witches, and I shrugged.

"Maybe for others, but this is my eighteenth birthday, and by god I'm gonna make it count."

I also had a diabolical plan, which I put into action after Rex and I snagged our ice creams and I made the bold move of sitting down in one of the little booths, forcing him to either abandon me to my depraved Witchery or take a seat opposite to supervise me in this public area. I smirked behind my scoop as he sat down with a look of defeat.

"So," I began, getting Rex's immediate attention as his eyes sharpened behind his glasses. "Let's talk."

"You want to talk?" Rex said suspiciously.

"Yeah. Talk. Get to know each other." I licked my ice cream to forestall any melting drips, then continued. "I know you're eighteen, you were born and raised in Death City, you applied to the DWMA when you were 13, you had _a_ partner before me, but you lost 'em somehow and won't talk about why. I know you like opera, some of your favorite ice cream flavors, and the fact that you fiddle with either one of your stud earrings when you're nervous. That's it."

Rex immediately yanked his hand down from his ear with a flush.

"So," I continued, kicking out my legs comfortably. "I figured we both got some questions about each other we want answered. I'll make you a deal. You can ask me one question, and I'll answer with nothing but the absolute gospel truth. Then I'll ask _you_ a question that you answer honestly. We'll bounce questions off of each other until the ice cream runs out, and then we'll leave."

"What happens if one of us asks a question the other doesn't want to answer?" Rex asked after a moment.

"You can say 'Pass' and the other person asks a different question." I said. I debated a rule about how many passes we'd get, but fair was fair, and without thinking long and hard about how many questions I didn't want to answer truthfully, I couldn't constrain him to the same number.

Rex nodded slowly, and gave a thoughtful lick to his Neopolitan. "So, which one of us goes first?"

"I'll start." I said. "When's _your_ birthday?"

"August 23." Rex answered, looking surprised that I had started with such a lowball question. "Um…"

He gave me a long, hard look, and it wasn't too hard to guess that he was fishing for things that could winkle out my obviously diabolical plan without alarming the storekeeper behind a counter less than twenty feet away. Or, you know, getting himself murdered.

" _If_ you were a Witch…what kind of magic would you specialize in?" he asked after a second. Oh, that was clever –phrasing it as a hypothetical, personality-defining sort of question.

I had to tongue my cotton-candy ice cream and _think_ for a second, though, because Witches in _Soul Eater_ practiced magic that was themed to certain animals or concepts, and, well, my magic was pretty general. Technically I hadn't ever even officially gotten past the "novice apprentice" stage that never did magic unsupervised, but fate had conspired against me on that one by throwing me first into _Black Butler_ , and now here.

"I'd have sigil-based magic, probably." I said after a moment. "Stuff that follows formulas and whatnot. Uh, you've got family in Death City, right? What are they like?"

Panic lashed across Rex's face, and I belatedly realized that that sounded a lot like I was fishing for potential hostages.

"Uh, never mind! Sorry! I didn't mean it like that!"

He relaxed, fractionally, in the sense that he no longer looked like he was about to leap out of his chair and bolt across the city in search of his family members.

"Ugh, badly-phrased question." I groaned. "Ummm…you were raised here, you ever traveled? Like gone on vacation or something?"

"Not really." Rex said. "You?"

"I've been to England, Japan, Germany, Italy, France, China, Spain, Russia, and a couple other places, but that was really only recently, like in the last year or so." I said. "Before that, I pretty much never left home. Why'd you not travel? Not interested, or no budget?"

"Budget." Rex answered, before narrowing his eyes. "Where'd _you_ grow up?"

"Virginia." I answered placidly, making him blink. "What, did you think I was from the Witch Realm or something? And no, that's not my next question."

"Uh…" Rex's eyes slid over to the man behind the counter, aware of the fact that he couldn't say that he actually _had_ thought I was from the Witch Realm, apparently.

"Anyways, Virginia." I said, smirking a little as I polished off more of my ice cream. "Did the accent not tip you off?"

Rex flushed a little.

"I thought you might be from Texas or something…" he mumbled, and I rolled my eyes.

"Honey, I ain't got the twang for Texas." I said, deepening my accent into a drawl to drive home the point. "Uh…favorite animal?"

"Raven." Rex said, and I snorted.

"You nerdy goth _loser_."

"Th-they're the most intelligent birds in the world!" Rex shot back, face red. "And they can learn words, just like parrots! What's _your_ favorite animal, then?"

"Cats."

"Oh, and like that's not the most stereotypical animal in the _world_ for a-"

I flicked my eyes urgently to the counter, and Rex changed direction.

"-um, cat-loving girl like you."

"Smooth." I deadpanned. Still, my devious plan was working nicely. While all the ice cream in the world couldn't fix our relationship now, it definitely couldn't _hurt_ , and aside from that, planning this 20 Questions game and feeding in innocent, normal, get-to-know-you questions had gotten Rex relaxed enough that he was daring to actually _rib_ me for what I was now realizing was indeed, technically, a very stereotypical choice. Five days or even an hour ago, Rex wouldn't have dared to question me no matter how weird or questionable my decisions were, and he certainly would have dared to _make fun_ of me.

We were making progress!

Granted, I didn't have a goal beyond "make Rex less obviously tense in my presence," but still, this was…nice. It was good to be friends again, even if Rex would immediately clam up once he realized what he was doing right now, how _casual_ he was being with a dastardly Witch.

"How'd you get into opera, anyway?" I asked, taking a lick.

"My parents got lottery tickets to _The Magic Flute_ , and I thought it was neat." Rex said with a shrug. "And then I downloaded a few operas for background noise while I was studying, and eventually I got curious about what the songs were actually _saying_ and borrowed a few DVDs from the library. Kinda went on from there. Ah…what sort of music do you like?"

"Not sure." I scratched my ear. "I like what sounds nice, but I dunno what that is half the time. Um, stuff with a lot of variation? I appreciate rap for its complexity, but I don't like how the, the beat stays the same the whole time. It's the beat, right? I don't know music stuff."

Rex shrugged.

"Anyways, yeah. Um-m-mm…if you _could_ go somewhere in the world, where would it be?"

"Italy sounds nice, and not just because its where a lot of operas are set." Rex said, flushing. "You?"

"Not sure. I've been traveling so much this past year, it'd almost be nice at this point to just sit at home and _rest_." I said with a sigh. "But that's not gonna happen, obviously, while I'm here at the academy. You ever had a pet?"

"No. You?"

"My family ran a horse-riding farm, but they weren't really _pets_. Know any languages other than English?"

"I know a bit of Japanese, since the DWMA encourages you to take a language elective. You?"

"Italian, German, French, Latin, and Greek, roughly in that order of fluency." I said, ticking them back on the fingers of my free hand. "I learned Italian and German from some friends, but the other three were for academic purposes only, so I'm not 100% on how well I could actually carry a conversation with 'em. You got any friends other than me?"

Rex tugged his earring, then realized what he was doing and let go again hastily. It was a pretty obvious answer.

Well, bang went my plan to use one of his other friends as a surrogate meister. Alas, since by virtue of them already being friends, Rex and said meister would have a jumpstart on their partnership bond.

"Anyways." he mumbled, turning red. "What about you? Did you make friends while you were traveling?"

"Did I ever!" I said. "These two guys named Romano and P- _Gilbert_ , we were like this inseparable trio back in Europe. Romano was the dude that taught me Italian, and he swore worse than a sailor on shore leave. Like I can curse up a blue streak in Italian, my dude, and it's all thanks to him."

Rex blinked.

"Gilbert was this wild prankster –seriously, he messed around with _everyone_ , even me when I was laid up in a hospital bed, once. He called, pretending to be all freaked out and thinking I might die, and then when I yelled at him that I was fine he laughed and told me that he knew that already. He used a spoon to flick peas at his - _cousin_ during a family dinner, to the point where his dinner partner laid Gilbert out with a frying pan to the skull. She was wicked accurate with those things."

"She didn't." Rex said, awed.

"She did." I said. "Anyways, me and the dudes hung out for a while, but then I had to…leave, and I met this dude named Snake and this girl named Mey-rin, and we all lived together in this huge house in London. Snake loved to read, just like me, and we had this competition going where one of us would say a book quote and then the other had to guess which book it was from or admit defeat. I lost a lot."

_Though that's mostly because the books I know weren't published in 1889._

"And Mey-rin was my roomie, and she was great with guns! Practically taught me everything I know about how to shoot, even though my pistol is a hella outdated model. She gave me a more modern one, but haven't really used it yet since, you know, I have you."

A silence dropped over the table as I then lowered my gaze to my ice cream and licked at it to avoid meeting Rex's eyes. Technically, I didn't even have him right now, and the knowledge of that came crashing down on our pleasant bubble of neutrality as soon as the words left my mouth. It was about damn time I stuck my foot in my mouth, I guess, since Rex had done it so often.

"I'm done with my ice cream." Rex said after a moment.

"Yeah." I said, contemplating my empty cone. "So…I guess we can go, then."

"Y-yeah."

We both got up in awkward silence, disposing of our trash in the nearby bin and walking outside without saying a word.

"You…think we can do this again tomorrow?" I asked hesitantly after a while of walking down the backlit streets, with the sinking sun branding all the adobe a deep orange. "Same time?"

"…sure." Rex said.

It was tense, but at least we'd taken a step in the right direction as far as "Rex not being terrified of me" went. Hopefully, we'd take another one tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: January 16th, 2021, 12.46 PM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: January 16th, 2021, 2.24 PM USA Central Time


	12. Zodiac: Libra

_Arya's POV:_

Halloween. All Hallows' Eve. To the ancient Gaelics, Samhain.

To Death City, apparently, some bizarre mix of Vatican City Easter, American football Superbowl, and normal Halloween celebrations. The city had been subtly preparing for weeks –a few more orange and black garlands here, some more bat motifs and jack-o-lanterns there, some posters, some decorations, apparently an absolute run on all the costume stores– but now, on October 31st, I had spent most of yesterday staring in dumb shock at the sudden explosion of decorations and holiday spirit as the entire city was transfixed by a whirlwind of festive mania.

Now, siting in _42 Icecream_ , I was trying to offer Rex an orange-sherbet and chocolate mix with little batty sprinkles on top for comfort, and failing miserably.

For a whole week, we'd been coming here after school, to the point where the owner practically reserved the window booth for us, and with enough devoted poking and prodding and get-to-know-you questions, I'd _almost_ gotten us to the point where we were wary of each other, but still on cordial terms. Rex didn't look like he'd keel over if I threatened him anymore, and he no longer frantically checked the spot for contamination or poisoning whenever I accidentally brushed up against him. For my part, I knew a lot more about Rex and his various quirks, which would hypothetically help me in my quest to get him a new partner.

I wasn't sure I liked the idea of finding a different partner for _me_ , though. Rex already knew so much about the stuff I needed to keep under wraps, it might just be easier to suck it up and tough it out with him by my side, rather than going to the potentially enormous risk of leaving him as a loose end when I found a new Weapon. The only way I could be absolutely _sure_ Rex wouldn't talk was to kill him –obviously, a ghastly and impossible thought– or just stick with him like glue to make sure he didn't have a _reason_ to out me. Aside from the blackmail and the impenetrable tangle of his past partner issues, I also _liked_ Rex as a friend, and didn't want to leave with things half undone.

My concerns were not the problem right now, though, because Sid had been murdered sometime late last night, and Rex was understandably distraught.

Since I knew Sid was going to be coming back arguably stronger than when he'd died, obviously I was much less grief-stricken, but there was no way to express that without either making Rex accuse me of insanity or of being a heartless monster. I was instead left to made exaggeratedly happy noises with my ice cream as Rex stared dully at his artistic bowl, not once having set spoon to treat.

"Sooo…" I finally said, tapping a finger on the table. "Is this a "shut up" kind of grief situation or a "please fill the silence" kind of grief situation?"

Rex made a vague noise, palming his cheek and setting his elbow on the table, and finally he finally lifted his free hand to prod listlessly at the ice cream with the plastic spoon.

There was a bit of ambiguity there.

"The Death Festival is nice." I continued, mentally cautious but keeping my tone bright. "Halloween's an awesome holiday. I really like the gothic aesthetic, and dressing up in costumes is so fun. Plus there's free candy, and going house to house at night is kinda like an adventure to get free candy. It's a great holiday. Better than Thanksgiving, which is racist as shit, and Christmas got overtaken by capitalism ages ago."

I wondered if history had been changed enough that those weren't actually holidays people celebrated, and Rex thought I was talking about some weird Witch shit.

"Plus fall is a beautiful time of year. I lived up in Virginia, you know, so we get them fall leaves like aaaaaall up in the forest. Glorious. People fucking come as tourists to check out our leaves. Uh, not my family's specifically, just like- all the leaves."

Rex made another vague noise, swirling his spoon around and around in the ice cream and turning it into a sludgy, mud-colored mess.

Fuck it. I was ripping the bandaid off.

"You know, Sid's been at the DWMA for a while." I said quietly. "He knew the risk of what I was doing, and I bet he was glad that it was him rather than any of his subordinates who got killed. I know I would be."

"You don't know Sid." Rex said, his voice hoarse. "You don't know how he died, either."

Technically I _did_ , but I couldn't exactly say that.

"No, but I do know how he lived." I said. "He would want us to be strong now, right? To keep soldiering on and avenge him, or at least live our lives to the best they can be. He's a teacher. He always wanted us to learn and be better."

"Yeah…yeah." Rex straightened up a little, and a bittersweet smile ghosted over his face. He was still sad, obviously, but he was no longer in a fetal ball of depression, and hopefully that state of mind would last for long enough for Stein to bring Sid back to life, and then, of course, the source of Rex's sadness would be fixed.

Sudden movement on the street made me glance over to the window, and I tensed and grabbed Rex by the collar, yanking him full-body over the table. Rex instinctively transformed –responding to my movement as his meister or to the rain of shards as the glass window exploded over our heads– and I was already rolling backwards out of the booth with Rex in tow by the time the Traitor straightened up, standing with a crooked head on our now-ruined table. It was some girl I didn't know, but the fuku and tiny Lord Death patch on her collar let me know that this was a fellow NOT student. She didn't have a finger-blade of any kind, but there was a large, pointed shard of glass clenched in her left hand. Her fingers were bleeding profusely around it, but she didn't seem to feel any pain.

Her right eye glowed with a lurid swirl of purple and red.

"Another of those Traitors?!" Rex gasped. "Wait –she's a NOT student!"

Ah, the expository speeches of anime. How I hadn't missed them.

"Rex, transform back and see if you can find some rope in the store or the kitchen or something." I said, keeping my eyes on her. "And tell the owner to call the police or the DWMA or something."

"What are you gonna do?!"

"She doesn't have a blade, so she can't poison me." I said. "I'm gonna tackle her and go from there."

"But-"

"Look, we can't fight as a unit, so just get the stuff and let me fight alone!" I snapped.

"I-"

But the girl wasn't going to give us any more time to argue as she jumped off the table, and I dropped Rex and moved into her lunge, grabbing her left wrist. If I controlled that, I'd win this fight, since she was a middle-schooler and I was larger and heavier.

The room flashed blue as I heard footsteps, so Rex must've listened to me, and I hooked my foot around the back of the Traitor's ankle and sharply jerked it towards myself as we both grappled for her makeshift blade. She fell backwards and I rode her to the ground, wincing at the crunch of glass beneath us both as her back hit the floor. Hopefully, she hadn't cut or stabbed anything important, and even if she didn't react to the fall like a _normal_ person should by getting dizzy or even sparking out, I was still able to twist upright, practically straddling her ribs as I grabbed her "knife" arm with both hands. She strained against me, trying to bring the glass shard down on my wrists or stab it up into my torso, her expression blank and both eyes mindless. There was still _some_ kind of intelligence in there, though, because when I proved strong enough to limit her movements she tried to grab her weapon and switch hands, forcing me to grab both of her wrists as we struggled together on the floor.

"I'm back!" Rex said as his footsteps crunched over to me.

"What've you got?" I grunted, the glass shard swaying and jerking dangerously as me and the girl strained to control it.

"Zip-ties."

"Great, I'll try to get her wrists together, and you lock 'em." I said through my teeth, then shifted and spread my elbows, slamming the girl's wrists together as hard as I could. In a normal person, the pain of that would've made her gasp and her grip weaken, but under the spell of Shaula's venom, the girl didn't even react. She just immediately started to try and pry them apart again, because whatever limited intelligence that was driving her either let her compute our words about tying her up, or she was just trying to resist whatever I was doing solely because I was trying to do it to her. It was kinda hard to tell.

Getting the spread zip-tie over her shard of glass and fists was equally if not more difficult, especially with all the little jerks and swerves that happened when she strained especially hard against me, and then we were presented with a new challenge as Rex got it down over them –to where my hands were keeping her from shrugging out of the tie. Rex looked at me with a question in his eyes, and I hissed out a thoughtful breath.

"Uh, get ready to tighten it." I said. "I'll slide my hands down an inch, and you can lock it then."

Rex nodded, and we did just that –he yanked the zip-tie tight just as soon as I moved my hands out of the way, clasping the NOT girl's wrists together as she continued to struggle and writhe beneath us. It was obvious that one tie wasn't going to hold her for long.

We didn't take any chances. We were _practical_ , and zip-tied a dozen more over her wrists, all the way down to her elbows –after grabbing her shard of glass, of course– and then borrowing an apron from the ice cream guy and wrapping it around her arms before tying them to her chest in a makeshift straitjacket. We also zip-tied her ankles and used another apron to bundle her lower legs up, then dragged her over to a folding chair and zip-tied her ankles and upper arms to _that_ , as well. The whole time, she didn't stop squirming, and we regarded even her bound form with worry as the storekeeper fretted in the dubiously safe recesses of the kitchen.

"You might wanna douse the power and then lock yourself in the freezer or something." I said to him in aside, staring at the girl. "At least until the DWMA gets here."

Rex nodded.

"Thank Lord Death the both of you were here instead of at the Festival." the storekeeper said, wringing his hands. "If you hadn't been-"

"The Festival!" Rex gasped in that anime tone of sudden realization, and bolted out the door.

"Oh, uh, shit, yeah lock yourself up somewhere safe until the day's over I guess -REX GET BACK HERE!" I yelled as I ran out into the street. He didn't listen to me, of course. What did a Witch know?

Eh, I probably knew a heck of a lot about what was going on right now, by Rex's logic. That was probably why he slowed down not even a block away, and turned to me with a glare when I caught up.

"Did _you_ -"

"Nope, not on me, none of my plans or business." I said immediately, a little out of breath. "Also, those Traitors should be fuckin' _everywhere_ , so let's not run off without any kind of a plan, huh?"

"You _knew_ about this?" Rex said in tones of utmost betrayal.

"Eh." I answered vaguely. "Not really? I can, uh, sense the magic from the Witch controlling this, though. It's everywhere."

"Can you lead us to the source?" Rex asked, a gleam in his eye.

I did not like that gleam.

"Uh…maybe?" I said delicately. I couldn't _actually_ sense Shaula's power, and all I knew was that she was in some kind of churchyard-like area, on top of the church, and Tsugumi and Anya had tracked her there by messenger bats. "You do realize, though, that we're both NOTs? And we're _shit_ at fighting together, don't lie to me and say we aren't. I can barely wield you."

"But we're _trying_ to hurt or kill our target, this time." Rex said, before his expression quickly shuttered and he took a step back. "Unless you have a problem with hurting another Witch-"

"I don't give a damn about her." I sneered automatically, which made him relax. And he _did_ …kinda have a point. Hitting harder than I meant to was hardly a problem when I _meant_ to kill this woman. We'd been steadily getting better at dealing with each other, too…it was just barely within the realm of possibility that we'd actually manage to take down a Witch.

And if we didn't work together well enough?

I had my Colt on my hip, in preparation for this day.

"Fine." I said with a short breath through my nose. "We'll do this. But we have to be careful of all the infected NOTs and regular people and whoever else is wandering around –they'll attack us, and we don't have time for detours."

"Can you disguise us with magic?" Rex asked as we started off down the road again, me looking up at the sky for bats.

"Not my speed." I answered absently. A flicker of movement – _there_ , and I glanced ahead to an alley and turned on its corner. "Keep me posted if there's anyone ahead of us, I'm following her familiars."

Rex grunted in acknowledgement, and with his help, I managed to thread my way through the city, following the errant flapping of bats. Soon we were aided by the sound of explosions as well, and I slowed to a stop, holding out a hand to stop Rex as well.

"What is it?" he asked, looking at me. I looked down the thankfully-deserted street to the cross-section of another road and the rise of the familiar church and belltower beyond. It was there, behind a row of houses, that flashes of pink light and explosions were streaking into the sky.

"We're too late." I said. "Some of the other NOT kids are taking care of her."

"How can you be sure?" Rex asked as I saw a figure in a dark dress with vibrantly-patterned hair flip up onto the flat roof.

"That's her, Shaula Gorgon, and she is about to be fuckin' _obliterated_."

"How do you-"

A spear of pinkish light lanced up from the ground as, even from here, we heard the courageous yelling of Anya and Meme. That light drilled right through Shaula's side, and she staggered, half her body torn away, before withering into nothing as Anya and Meme skidded to a stop at the edge of the rooftop, Tsugumi's Weapon form held between them and no longer glowing.

"Oh." Rex said dumbly.

"Yup." I said. "First come, first serve, and we were too late. Oh well. We probably wouldn't have done that good against a Witch anyways."

"I guess…" he agreed, a little reluctantly. "Now what?"

"Well, if she's dead, then all her thralls should've stopped being thralls, so…I guess we can help with cleanup?" I said, scratching my cheek.

Rex shrugged, and we looked around the street for something to do. Thankfully, this street seemed to have largely missed out on all the rioting and stuff, and we meandered down towards the intersection, looking both ways for any disasters to clean up when we got there. Rex seemed a little disappointed that we hadn't gotten to duel Shaula, but also relieved –he likely knew as well as I did that Witches were tough customers, and assigned as the last part of soul-collection for a _reason_.

"At least we can help with that." he said, pointing towards some kind of storage building with the wooden shutters torn off on the ground floor, probably to be splintered and then used as clubs.

"Hey, disaster cleanup is a noble task."

"I know, it's just…I wanted to do more." Rex said as we reached it, leaning down to pick up some of the discarded bolts. "I wanted to help avenge Sid."

There was really nothing to say to that, and I looked away uncomfortably, my eyes skating across the dim interior of the empty storage room that this particular awning had protected.

There was a skitter of movement inside across the floor inside, and I froze.

That was a _scorpion_.

Maybe it was nothing. Death City _was_ in a desert, after all. There was no reason for a scorpion not to be here, except for the fact that it was inside a building owned by someone, it was also widely considered a pest, and it was in the vicinity of a Witch who had two big sisters that had cheated death before by stuffing their souls or the fragments thereof into their signature animal.

I ran into the room. I had tough hiking boots on, and I could afford stomp that scorpion with them.

"Arya-?!"

Rex scampered in behind me, and I saw the scorpion rustling in the darkness and raised my foot and-

-was slammed back by an implosion of magic, hitting Rex as I flew across the floor and taking us both down to the ground as red-purple light swirled around the room. Despite being tangled so hopelessly together, we both managed to look up in time to see an enraged-looking Shaula, multicolored eyes dancing with fury, one hand outstretched towards us.

"DWMA _filth_." she snarled, and I gulped. I could feel Rex trembling underneath me.

"Don't you know squatting in someone else's storage block is rude?" I said as my mind temporarily shorted out. I couldn't think of what to do, and for lack of anything else to stall her while I came up with an idea, my brain apparently defaulted to "sarcastic quip."

Probably not the _best_ decision, but my thoughts weren't really moving quickly right now. Or coherently. This was the closest I'd come to staring death in the face for a good long while, and the most helpless I'd ever felt while doing it. Facing Shaula while on our feet and in the open was one thing, facing her while we were gracelessly collapsed on the ground was quite another.

I quickly grabbed the cloth of Rex's shoulder and he transformed into my hand, so at least _that_ obstacle was gone, and when Shaula reared back I scraped my foot around and hauled myself to my feet, lunging sideways as her braided tail of hair stabbed into the concrete where we had been. My heart slammed against my ribs as I kept Rex between me and Shaula and backed away from the wall I'd nearly run into, cautiously feeling my way towards the exit behind us.

"Arya..." Rex said, and I could almost _feel_ his fear.

"Chill." I said, my mouth dry. "I've…maybe got this."

"Oh do you, now?" Shaula hissed, her braid pulling back. I wasn't sure if it was flesh or hair or something else entirely, only that it was the same poisonously vibrant shade of magenta and purple that her eyes and the eyes of her Traitors had been, and dappled all over in a weird, flower-like pattern. "I may have been defeated by those brats, but I've lost my patience with you scum. You'll die like the filth you are!"

"Or you'll die like the bug you are." I said. "Scorpions are bugs, aren't they? Like, arachnids, at least."

Before Shaula could reply to that somewhat disingenuous statement, I twisted my will in a familiar pattern, and a shimmering yellow wall appeared between us. I took a hand from Rex as his tip clinked to the floor and _shoved_ , both with my mind and my hand, and the magic wall slammed Shaula back across the room, crushing her to the brick –and continuing to exert pressure.

"What?!" Shaula choked. "You-"

"Not interested in hearing the _nani the fuck?_ anime bullshit today." I muttered, lowering my eyelids as I continued to shove, the brickwork starting to crack behind Shaula's body. "Just fucking die already."

She bared her teeth in a snarl as the bruise-colored glow of her magic suddenly seethed to life around the _real_ Witch's body, and I felt pressure being exerted back against my wall. That was fine, I could just keep upping the ante. She'd just lost a fight, and whatever fakeout she'd used to survive it, she still _had_ been injured in some way, or at least weakened and exhausted. I could beat her. I could totally beat her.

For a few seconds, the air thickened and shimmered with magic as we strained against each other. I eventually had to drop Rex and close my eyes, putting all of my concentration and effort into crushing Shaula into the wall like the bug I'd named her. It was fine, she was pinned there with my magic, I could totally manage this. Sure, she was strong, but this much magic being used was bound to alert meisters sooner or later, and at this point, I'd take being busted over Shaula winning out. I was obviously trying to kill her, and thus was on the DWMA's side, and Rex could vouch for me as far as that went. I therefore wouldn't be killed on sight if I was exposed as a Witch, and then maybe I could explain what I wanted and actually have things progress faster.

Something twinged at the edge of my consciousness, but I couldn't pay attention to that, because my magic wall fractured and broke at the same moment with a sound like shattering glass. Rex screamed my name as my eyes shot open, and I froze.

"Kh-!"

Shaula was standing in front of me, eyes burning with hate.

Rex was standing between us.

The point of Shaula's stinger was buried in Rex's chest, and he was already starting to twitch as foam leaked over his lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: January 17th, 2021, 11.25 AM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: January 17th, 2021, 11.22 AM USA Central Time


	13. Zodiac: Scorpio

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have Arya and Rex killsteal from Tsugumi and gang because A) after inventing over a 100 minor two-line OCs and almost as many arc-centric Kishin OCs, creating even one more is far too much effort, B) Tsugumi and her partners don't ever apply to EAT to my knowledge and thus never use the soul, and C) both of Shaula's sisters have cheated death via their animal forms at least once, and it seems sketchy that one member of the family can't do what the rest do.

_Arya's POV:_

"Ahaha~! Silly meisters and you Weapons, always so _sacrificial_ over each other." Shaula sneered, lifting Rex up into the air a little with a twitch of her braid. I immediately redirected the flow of my magic, channeling it desperately into Rex's body as healing energy. It wasn't as good as a sigil or as much as it'd be if I actually touched him, but it should help him last long enough for me to achieve both.

"We're not…exactly…" I managed to say, numb.

Why had Rex taken that shot for me? He could've just tackled me out of the way or something –he could've just fucking let me _die_ , as another Witch!

"Hmm? Oh, of _course_." Shaula's sneer widened as she pulled Rex to the side, so I could see both his face and hers at the same time as more foam bubbled over his chin. "This one's defective, isn't he? You don't _want_ him back. Poor little buster sword."

_What?!_

"What?!" I blurted. Rex's eyes twitched over to me, and he tried to say something, but Shaula's venom was paralytic –as well I knew from Sid's death– and Rex could barely move his lips. His expression was agonized.

Shaula cackled as she saw the dumbfounded shock on my face as my eyes flicked between her and him, and Rex's tortured expression.

"You don't know!" she gasped. "Oh, this is too delightful."

"How the fuck would _you_ even know?" I said, trying to play for time as I grabbed my Colt and pulled it out. It was a fair question, though –she was a Witch, and certainly not privy to DWMA gossip or teacher records. "This's about his first partner, isn't it?"

"His first, his third, and _all the dozen_ after." Shaula said with a lick of her lips as I blinked and actually took a step back.

"What…?"

"Why, it's the talk of the whole school, child. Rex Rayner, the unlucky buster sword. He can never find a true partner, and rumor has it that every partner he finds is cursed to never, _ever_ succeed in life. Did no one ever tell you?"

"I don't listen to gossip." I said numbly. This all fit too horribly into place –Rex's desperation to do whatever it took to please me during our first few days, the way people looked at me, at us, and _whispered_ , the relish on some people's faces when they saw Rex with meister competition that was now no longer worth competing with, the concern from the teachers who didn't care about stupid rumors of unluckiness but _did_ care about Rex's mental well-being; the concern from _Sid_ on the first day as he saw Rex partnering with someone too fast, knowing that such bonds were fragile and if Rex fucked it up the rumors would only get worse; the way Rex was desperate for me to just stay his partner officially even when he knew I could kill him for it later…

Everything. Everything _finally_ fit into a pattern.

I'd just been misled by the fact that Rex only mentioned his _one_ partner, presumably his _first_ partner.

Fuck it. Revelations later, fight now.

I twitched the fingers of my free hand as another wall appeared between Shaula and Rex, slicing right through her braid like a guillotine as she shrieked and staggered back. Rex collapsed, and before I did anything else I knelt by him and yanked out the stinger, then slapped my hand directly over the bloody spot on his shirt and conjured the strongest healing glyph I knew, layering it with as much power as I could and sealing it with a twist of will before Shaula recovered. I wasn't sure what the hell her venom actually _did_ , since Sid had gotten his head crushed less than five minutes after he was poisoned, but anything that made you foam at the mouth was bad by definition –not to mention the fact that her stinger had stabbed Rex right in the chest. He needed help.

I _also_ needed help, though, as Shaula recovered and roared with rage, slamming her hand out as intricate red sigils appeared and swarmed around her in the air, lighting up before spitting a volley of blackish projectiles at us. I conjured another of my magic walls for a shield and ran through the spells I actually remembered how to do, very few of which were combat-useful. I'd memorized sigils to ensure levitation in small objects and create a thin coating of frost, and that was it. I could always just _shoot_ her, but I only had five bullets in my gun, and reloading with the shells in my pockets would take a few moments.

Not to mention I could only reasonably put so many bullets in my pockets.

Still, it was my only reasonable method of counterattack right now, so I pulled the hammer back and eyed Shaula as her barrage of magic missiles came to a halt. She'd probably try something that involved going around my shield, and so as her sigils faded out I dropped the magic wall entirely and pulled up my gun.

**Blam!**

_Pull hammer back._

**Blam!**

_Pull hammer back._

**Blam!**

_Pull hammer back._

**Blam!**

_Pull hammer back._

**Blam!**

_Pull hammer back._

_Reload._

Shaula's prehensile braid twitched around frantically as I shot, blocking each of my bullets as she took a step backwards, shock flicking across her face. It clearly _hurt_ her, from the subtle wince as she took each bullet with her wounded –tail? braid? but even so, I wasn't doing any actual _damage_. Still, a Shaula that was wincing and dodging was a Shaula that wasn't attacking us, and for right now, I'd take that.

Problem was that I couldn't take that forever, since I had _maybe_ two and a half reloads in my pockets.

I pulled the wall back up as I ran out of bullets, hastily starting to reload. "Rex, you with me?" I asked, and heard a faint cough. Well, coughing was better than nothing, since it implied lung-clearing movement, which also implied that Rex was _able_ to move, at least a little, which meant my healing spell was working.

"A Witch who relies on mundane weaponry and a half-dead useless Weapon is no Witch at all." Shaula sneered, drawing herself up to her full height –not that that meant much– as her eyes began to glow again. I wasn't sure what that meant, exactly, but it couldn't be good. "I'll crush the both of you. I'll shred you into pieces!"

"Mm-hm." I said, slamming the last of my bullets home and snapping the Colt shut. I might only be able to reliably summon my magic walls, but they were surprisingly versatile, and much better than nothing, or nothing-with-a-few-bullets. I could, maybe, find a way to swing this.

The stunted end of Shaula's braid plunged into the ground, and huge purple scorpion stingers haloed in red burst out of the concrete around us. My magic wall twisted and curved to form a bubble as those tails began to rain blows down upon the both of us –at this point, I was playing for time in every sense. Time to find an opening, time for some other, more qualified DWMA teams to find us, time for Rex to recover, time to think of a fucking plan.

Turning my back on Shaula was stupid, but with my eyes open, I'd be able to tell when my magic walls started to crack, and form new ones underneath them.

Rex was ghastly pale, but he was breathing normally, and even managed to lift an arm to wipe the foam off of his chin.

"Arya…"

"Can you transform?" I asked, holstering my gun again, and watched his eyes widen.

"But we can't- when we fight…" he gasped and I covered my face with one hand to hide my scowl. This was the exact same fucking scenario that I'd wanted to avoid –the one where we'd have an explosive argument that was resolved by a life-threatening event and all the secrets would come gushing out. Anime tropes demanded at this point that I encourage him with some bullshit about how I totally forgave him for misleading me and how we could _totally_ do this together with our newly strengthened bond of friendship, but I was in no mood to mouth anime lines through gritted teeth right now.

"You took a bullet for me." I said, poking his chest and sending an extra jolt of healing energy through him as a bit of color returned to Rex's face. "Or close enough, anyways. If that doesn't make you a good enough partner, then what does?"

"Only 'good enough'?" Shaula shrieked from beyond my shields and the thrashing of her magic scorpion tails. "Inferior to the last, I see! She'd be better off grabbing a random student from the street!"

"Oh shut the fuck up with your psychoanalyst bullshit!" I snapped over my shoulder. "You telling us this because you want to see us improve and reach our full potential or something?! Choke on your own Kool-aid and _die_ , bitch!"

Shaula roared as the frantic beating of the scorpion tails increased, and I felt my shield shudder lightly under the pressure. We were running out of time.

I spread my hand more over Rex's chest and tried to _force_ vitality into him, and after a few seconds he grabbed my shoulder and let me help him sit up.

"Look, I hate to be putting this much pressure on ya, but can you transform now?" I asked, eyeing my shield worriedly and trying to split my power between that and Rex as economically as I could.

"We can't beat her." he gasped. "W-we're not strong enough."

 _Fucking_ anime tropes.

"Ugh." I groaned. "Alright, so there was blackmail and coercion at the start of our partnership! Alright, so we started off on the wrong foot! But you are my _partner_ now, Rex! I've accepted it –no, I've _decided_ it! We're partners! It's official! So unless you want your partner to _die_ , you'll transform and help me kill her, now!"

"That's her desperation talking~" Shaula hissed, and jerked to the side as I cast a shield horizontally at her head, trying to cut her down.

"Oh, so it's weird for me to rely on my partner? _My_ Weapon? Got something to say about how we do things at the DWMA, bitch? I know your skank ass was offering a whole lot of opinions on that earlier with those other girls! Or are partnerships only lame when someone's trying to unbrainwash one of your pawns!?" I glanced down at the Weapon in my arms. "REX!"

We made eye contact, and he swallowed –then writhed out of existence as I wrapped my hands around the familiar grip of his handle.

Oh… _this_ was different. Rex felt lighter than he'd ever felt before, and even as I stretched and pulled at my shields to let me stand up, I marveled at it. The sudden _ease_ with which we moved was incredible –I couldn't describe the difference, except it was like Rex had been dragging about fifty feet of chains behind him that I'd never noticed and they were suddenly _gone_ now. I understood so much more about how meister-Weapon teams were supposed to _properly_ work at this moment, understood how we'd never actually even come close to it before –but now, at last, we fit.

Made sense, I guess. We both had a plethora of reasons to want Shaula dead right now, and we _recognized_ each other's wills as a true Weapon-meister team should.

I shoved my walls out and expanded them, slamming the scorpion tails to the side along a path from me to Shaula as I unholstered my gun again and shot. One-handed, I could only shoot the one bullet –my Colt was the true historic model that you needed pull the hammer back between each shot– but with Shaula's hair rooted to the ground, she could either die, or yank up her hair and presumably stop summoning all these tails.

Shaula chose the second option, uprooting her braid as the other tails all withered away. We couldn't afford to give her time to choose another spell, so I was shoving my Colt back almost as soon as I shot and running for her, cocking Rex back for a swing.

This was quite honestly incredible. Wielding Rex was almost effortless –he barely weighed anything to me, but when Shaula tried to catch him with her braid of hair, Rex sliced off another portion as he came down like a cleaver. Shaula screamed, and was reduced to desperately blocking us with magic as I sliced at her, using each hit or miss as a rebound for my next swing. Rex gouged into the concrete like butter and shredded bits of Shaula's fuku-esque purple dress, and if not for the glow of magic around her arms, we'd have probably broken them long ago.

"Scorpion Scissors!" Shaula cried, crossing her arms and flinging them outwards as two shining red constructs of light came up, snapping down at us. I didn't back away, summoning my own magic as the bladed tails skittered off my magic walls and faded away.

"Kuh-!" Shaula hissed. "Why would you, a Witch, side with these scum!? You'd kill your own sisters, and for what! For measly scraps of power that the Grim Reaper deals you?!"

Ah, we'd reached the backed-into-a-corner-bargaining stage of a boss fight. _Great_.

"With your family history, that's rich." I managed to shoot back, ducking under a wild swing from her fist and bringing Rex around as she jumped back. "Ain't you Arachne's little sister?"

" _You_ -"

Shaula extended once too often as I swiped Rex down, and she screamed, falling to her knees and clutching at the stump of her wrist as blood poured down her arm. I swept Rex up from the ground, and Shaula gurgled weakly as his point rammed straight through her chest and out through her back. Our eyes locked, face to face from where she kneeled on the ground and I bent over her, and Shaula managed one last sneering smile.

"Enjoy your power while you have it, _Witch_." she choked. "The DWMA will find you sooner or later, and they'll burn you alive."

"Nice foreshadowing." I said, and yanked Rex out. "I'll keep it in mind."

Shaula's form darkened, turning to a cutout black silhouette, before she vanished entirely in a burst of magenta light, leaving a single soul floating in the air. It was about the size of an apple, maybe a bit smaller, and glowing an amethyst-colored purple that got lighter towards the center. The waving, off-center tail at the top was curved and hooked, a bit like a scorpion's tail, and there were two rounded protrusions on either side, curving down a bit like scorpion claws.

"Is she dead?" Rex asked from my hand. Somewhat chillingly –from my perspective, at least– his blade wasn't even _bloody_ , except for a streak where we'd taken off her hand. For lack of anything more scientific, I leaned over and poked the soul –it felt smooth and soft, a bit like the bubble it resembled, and slightly warm.

"Should be." I answered. "This is definitely a Witch's soul, and we definitely did stab her. We should probably take it in to be examined, but yeah, I'd say we killed our Witch."

"Our…?"

I brought Rex up to look into his blade as he obligingly appeared on the reflection. "Dude, I wasn't talking desperation back there. For better or worse, I think we'll be stuck together for a while, so we might as well make ourselves useful while we do it. We just killed a fucking _Witch_ –I think they'll let us into EAT now, if we push it."

Rex looked stunned.

"We're also going to have ourselves a nice, friendly, honest chat with each other later today, or tomorrow at the very latest." I said, making his expression drop like a stone. "I'm not gonna take Shaula's word for what's what, but I'm also fifty years _past_ tired of all the mystery around you and your last partner…s. So, you and me are going to have a talk full of healthy and reciprocal communication, like the effective partners we are, after we finish with cleanup. How's your chest, by the way?"

"Sore." Rex said, rubbing it with a rueful expression. He looked down and pulled his shirt away from his chest, which was very odd to watch from the other side of the reflection on a blade. "There's only a red mark left, though. How'd you do that?"

"Stuffed you full of magic." I said, watching him look nervous again. "I don't really know that many healing spells, so the best I can do is shove a bucketload of magic into you with the _intent_ to heal, and let it do its thing. Wastes a lot of power, but it was better than letting you bleed out or die."

"Yeah." Rex rubbed his chest again, and I let him go as he flashed back into human shape and tentatively grabbed Shaula's soul. "So…do I eat it now?"

"I wouldn't." I said, cupping my chin. "Its supposed to be saved for last for a reason, and we do actually gotta confirm that it is her soul. We can reserve it for you, in any case, for after we get our 99 Kishin."

I grinned, and lightly elbowed his side.

"Even if we're doing this whole thing all bass-ackwards, getting a Witch's soul in NOT before we even touch the Kishin Eggs."

Rex smiled back at me.

__

_***Time Skip***_

Cleanup, of course, took ages. There was all the people Shaula and the Traitors had brainwashed, all the damage they'd done, all the destruction of property to record and half-heartedly fix before the contractors showed up, and all the people who'd been injured to take to the hospital.

Then there was the DWMA stuff, the debriefing that Naigus gave me and Rex (thankfully after I reminded him not to say anything about his healing or my use of magic in the fight) about our encounter with Shaula, the confirmation that we actually _had_ killed Shaula, the reservation of her soul for after we finishing killing our way through Kishin Eggs, the statement that we wanted to go to EAT, the reminder that we were midsemester, and then puppy eyes from both me _and_ Rex and some rather impassioned begging, and then a reluctant meeting with some of the other faculty, and the promise of several practical tests before _maybe_ we'd be advanced to EAT.

With all that, it was full dark by the time Rex and I were trudging back down the steps, and even then, we still had our little talk to start. I dragged him off into the parking lot for the student bikes and whatnot, which was private enough that we wouldn't be overhead, and snagged two cans of soda from the vending machine before parking myself on the stone wall around the small lot. After a moment of hesitation, Rex sat next to me, and I handed him his. He didn't seem inclined to touch it, but it'd have been unspeakably rude to have grabbed a drink for myself and then offered him nothing.

"So," I began after a moment of silence waiting for him to start instead, snapping open my can of soda. "Over a dozen meisters, huh?"

Rex opened his mouth, then closed it again. He nodded, ever so slightly.

"What's the deal there?"

"Usually, it was sorta the same thing like with you." he explained, making me wince. "B-before I could fully transform, well…no one really wants to team up silence _that_ early on."

I nodded in agreement with that estimation, before raising the can to my mouth and taking a sip.

"And after I figured it out," Rex continued, looking at his hands in his lap. "-well, you know. Not many people are even willing to try to learn to fight with a weapon almost as big as they are. And since your Soul Wavelengths need to be at least mostly in tune for a Weapon to feel light…"

"You felt as heavy as you looked." I said, lowering my soda.

"Yeah. S-so most of the people coming through the NOT class barely wanted to deal with me. And when I did pick up a few meisters, ones that actually wanted to try things out with me…it didn't go well."

"Define not going well." I said, idly flicking the metal tab on the top of my can.

Rex heaved a huge, mournful sigh. "My first meister tried, he really did, but…when we started trying out for more serious stuff, seeing if we could move up into EAT…he got freaked out. I think he realized how much work being an EAT student is, how much effort he was going to have to put into his dream of being a hero. I think it might not have been totally conscious, but I'm fairly sure he might've come to the DWMA just so he could reap the benefits of the job, y'know?"

"Wine, women, and song." I commented wryly. Rex laughed a little, sheepishly, and rubbed the back of his neck.

"M-maybe. But I wanted to stay here, and I tried picking up other partners in the NOT class, since I obviously didn't qualify for EAT on my own. I was with my first partner for over a year, and we were both friends with my second one, but after a while…looking at it in hindsight, I think I put too much pressure on them. I was still moping after my first partner, and I was comparing him to them constantly, and I was always trying to get them to do more, push harder. Eventually, after about six months, our Soul Wavelengths fell out of line, and we started arguing pretty much constantly, and avoided each other whenever we could. Eventually we realized our partnership wasn't working out and we just…stopped."

"Ouch." I commented. "On both ends."

"Yeah. I was only fifteen, so I didn't really understand the situation quite as well as I do now, but I definitely didn't want another partner I actually knew. A few meisters in the new NOT crop wanted me because my Weapon form looked cool, and so I thought a fresh start was the best way to go."

"It was not?"

"It was not." Rex confirmed glumly. "Those partnerships barely lasted a month each. My cousin actually volunteered to be my meister for a while –he didn't inherit the Weapon genes like I did but he still came to the DWMA– and that was f- _fine_ , until I realized…we didn't _do_ anything. I didn't come to the DWMA to just be someone's partner, I wanted to _help_ people. But even though my cousin didn't even think of abandoning me once, he was _awful_ at fighting and he never even tried to advance or improve either one of us."

"So you dropped his ass like a hot coal." I guessed, looking into the darkness inside of my can to judge how much was left before taking another drink.

"Maybe not so violently…" Rex mumbled. "But eventually, yeah. I-I told him I was happy he cared, but I didn't want a pity-partner, and I wanted someone who could fight with me. He understood, and we broke up our partnership. I tried finding a new meister, but…word got around. I was the cursed buster sword that nobody wanted, and anybody who picked me up was doomed to failure. I kept coming to the NOT classes and learning as much as I could, and I kept trying in the partnership games, and sometimes I'd get lucky and someone'd try me out for a few weeks, but it always failed and I always ended up alone. By the time you came around, I was desperate."

"Desperate enough to blackmail a Witch and not tell Lord Death about her infiltrating the school." I said wryly, leaning back to take another sip of my soda as I braced myself with one hand on the low stone wall.

Rex flinched.

"Y-yeah…that reminds me, why are you here again?" he asked bravely.

I considered my options for that one, slowly tapping a finger against my soda as the nearly-hollow can echoed faintly with each tap.

"Well, healthy communication, healthy relationship." I said after a moment. "I'm not here to bring down the school from within or anything like that, I can assure you."

Rex's tense shoulders eased a little.

"Actually, if I'm gonna be brutally honest here, I'm not at the DWMA because I want to do anything to anyone. I'm here for a book. Several books, actually."

"A book?" Rex blinked.

"A high-level, super restricted, Level 4 book." I said ponderously, and moved my hand over to pat it onto his knee. "Level 4 being open only to Death Scythes and select high-ranking meisters. You see where I'm going with this?"

"You want to turn me into a Death Scythe so you can get…a book." Rex said slowly, blinking again.

"Well it's not like I can make _myself_ into a Death Scythe. And who fucking knows what "select meisters" means, since the instructor's tier is one level below Level 4."

"Um, not that I really want to encourage you to do this, b-but wouldn't it be easier to just steal the book you want, instead of going through all the effort of creating a Death Scythe?" Rex said nervously. "Now that you have access to the library, I mean."

"Uh-uh." I shook my head. "Not unless I somehow steal the whole level, and I can guarantee you I have no idea how that would work. See, Rex, I don't know which book or books I need are up there, only that they are. I need to go and look myself –or failing that, someone to go and look for me– before I even _think_ of taking them, legally or otherwise. That's why I need you for this, and also why I certainly don't plan on breaking any rules or doing anything diabolical."

"What do you want with the books?" Rex asked after a moment, frowning slightly. Soothed he may be by my explanation, but he was still a student at the DWMA, and he wasn't about to take evil, or potential seeds for evil, lightly.

"Nothing that affects anyone that isn't me." I said, waving him off. "It's some esoteric stuff so I can fix a mistake I made a while back, a mistake that's honestly going to fuck up my whole life if I let it go on for much longer. Nothing more. Okay?"

"Promise?"

"Promise."

I then smirked and held up my free hand, fingers curled into a fist and pinky extended. "I'll even pinky-swear on it if you want."

Rex huffed and looked away with a faint smile, but at least he didn't seem frightened anymore.

"So," I said, draining my can in one last go before continuing. "We've got a lot on our plates tomorrow, huh? Combat tests, packing up at our dorms –cause I don't know about you, but I _definitely_ want to live in an apartment closer to the school– and preparing for the EAT class. We should probably get going."

Rex kept his unopened can of soda with him as we both stood up, meandering over to the bus stop at the other side of the base of the stairs.

"You're gonna have to give my book back eventually, too."

He flinched.

"I know…" Rex mumbled, rubbing the back of his neck. "I just…give me a little time? You're still a Witch."

I rolled my eyes a little, but had to concede that point.

"I'll want it back by the time I've made you a Death Scythe, and not one day later." I said. "Keep it after that, and I _will_ come after you."

"F-fair enough." Rex said.

We stood together in silence, waiting for the bus as the stars twinkled faintly and the eternally-crescent moon laughed overhead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross-Posted: January 15th, 2021, 11.17 AM USA Central Time  
> Originally Posted: January 15th, 2021, 11.16 AM USA Central Time


End file.
